Systems, methods, and devices for prompting mobile device users for feedback information using tone transmissions

ABSTRACT

Systems, methods, and devices for prompting mobile device users for feedback information using tone transmissions are provided. One device may include a network interface, a display, a microphone, and a processor in communication with the network interface, display, and microphone, where the processor is configured to execute computer executable instructions to receive, by the microphone, a tone, where the tone includes a location identifier. The processor is further configured to execute computer executable instructions to extract the location identifier from the tone, and transmit, via the network interface, a signal that includes at least a portion of the location identifier. Moreover, the processor is further configured to execute computer executable instructions to receive, via the network interface, user prompting information associated with the location identifier, and display at least a portion of the user prompting information on the display.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is related to U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______(Attorney Docket No. 34250-1308) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled“Systems, Methods, and Devices for Administering Consumer RewardsPrograms Through the Use of Tones Sent to Mobile Devices”; U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. ______ (Attorney Docket No. 34250-1309) filed Mar.2, 2009 and entitled “Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for ProvidingPromotion Information to a Mobile Device”; U.S. patent application Ser.No. ______ (Attorney Docket No. 34250-1310) filed Mar. 2, 2009 andentitled “Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for Marketing by CommunicatingTones to a Mobile Device”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______(Attorney Docket No. 34250-1311) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled“Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for Communicating Information to aMobile Device in a Broadcast Signal”; U.S. patent application Ser. No.______ (Attorney Docket No. 34250-1312) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled“Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for Facilitating Communication BetweenMobile Devices”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______ (AttorneyDocket No. 34250-1314) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled “Systems,Methods, and Apparatus for Facilitating Transactions Using a MobileDevice”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______ (Attorney Docket No.34250-1315) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled “Systems, Methods, andApparatus for Providing Terms and Conditions and Program EnrollmentInformation to a Mobile Device”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______(Attorney Docket No. 34250-1316) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled“Systems, Methods, and Devices for Communicating SupplementalInformation to Mobile Devices”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______(Attorney Docket No. 34250-1325) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled“Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for Receiving Information by a MobileDevice”; U.S. patent application Ser. No. ______ (Attorney Docket No.34250-1326) filed Mar. 2, 2009 and entitled “Systems, Methods, andApparatus for Providing Information to a Mobile Device”; U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. ______ (Attorney Docket No. 34250-1327) filed Mar.2, 2009 and entitled “Systems, Methods, and Apparatus for ReceivingPromotion Information by a Mobile Device”; and U.S. patent applicationSer. No. ______ (Attorney Docket No. 34250-1328) filed Mar. 2, 2009 andentitled “Systems, Methods, and Devices for Processing FeedbackInformation Received from Mobile Devices Responding to ToneTransmissions.” Each of these applications is incorporated by referenceherein in its entirety.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

Embodiments of the invention relate generally to mobile devices, andmore particularly to systems, methods, and devices for prompting mobiledevice users for feedback information using tone transmissions.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Marketers, consumer product or service companies, and media contentproviders, often track the trends, interests, and/or preferences ofconsumers to make decisions about programming, advertising placement invarious forms of media, product and/or service features to be includedin new or updated products or services, or points of emphasis in anadvertisement or packaging based on consumer preferences. Marketers,consumer product companies, and the like obtain this information fromvarious sources including television and/or radio ratings, search enginecompanies, such as Google, various third party advertising agencies andservices, etc. Often this information is obtained through varioussurveys, consumer feedback through suggestions, complaints, etc., aswell as more sophisticated processes including Nielsen ratings, andstatistical information obtained through online marketplaces such asiTunes, etc.

However, the cost and implementation associated with conventional waysto monitor consumer's preferences, interests, tastes, and trends can besignificant, and the information obtained is often skewed by the meansused to obtain the information, which may require significantinteraction with a consumer, or may require a delay to process theinformation such that the information may be considered stale oroutdated information shortly after being compiled or inaccurate due tomany consumers' unwillingness to participate in providing user feedbackinformation.

Therefore, a need exists in the art for systems, methods, and apparatusfor addressing some or all of the shortcomings and limitations ofexisting marketing communication techniques.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Some or all of the above needs and/or problems may be addressed bycertain embodiments of the invention. In an example embodiment of theinvention, there is a mobile device that includes a network interface, adisplay, a microphone, and a processor in communication with the networkinterface, display, and microphone, where the processor is configured toexecute computer executable instructions to receive, by the microphone,a tone, where the tone includes a location identifier. The processor isfurther configured to execute computer executable instructions toextract the location identifier from the tone, and transmit, via thenetwork interface, a signal that includes at least a portion of thelocation identifier. Moreover, the processor is further configured toexecute computer executable instructions to receive, via the networkinterface, user prompting information associated with the locationidentifier, and display at least a portion of the user promptinginformation on the display.

In accordance with another embodiment of the invention, there is amethod that includes receiving, by a microphone of a mobile device, atone, where the tone includes a location identifier, and extracting, bya mobile device processor, the location identifier from the tone. Themethod further includes transmitting, via a network interface of themobile device, a signal that includes at least a portion of the locationidentifier, receiving, via the network interface of the mobile device,user prompting information associated with the location identifier froma remote information source, and displaying at least a portion of theuser prompting information on a display of the mobile device.

Additional systems, methods, apparatus, features, and aspects arerealized through the techniques of various embodiments of the invention.Other embodiments and aspects of the invention are described in detailherein and are considered a part of the claimed invention. Otheradvantages and features can be understood with reference to thedescription and to the drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Having thus described the invention in general terms, reference will nowbe made to the accompanying drawings, which are not necessarily drawn toscale, and wherein:

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of one example system that may facilitatethe communication of user prompting information to a mobile device andreceiving feedback information from the mobile device, according to anillustrative embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram of one example data flow 200 of transmitting aninformation carrying tone and retrieving user prompting informationassociated with the tone, according to an illustrative embodiment of theinvention.

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of yet another example system that mayfacilitate the communication of tones to a mobile device, according toan illustrative embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of data that may be included in an exampletone, according to an illustrative embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of one example method 500 for receivinginformation carrying tones at a mobile device, subsequent processing ofthe tone data by the mobile device, and/or providing feedbackinformation from a mobile device, according to an illustrativeembodiment of the invention.

FIG. 6 is a flow chart of one example method for processing userprompting information and/or feedback information at an informationsource, according to an illustrative embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of one example method for processing userprompting information and/or user feedback information with multipleinformation sources, according to an illustrative embodiment of theinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION

Example embodiments of the invention now will be described more fullyhereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which some,but not all embodiments of the invention are shown. Indeed, theinvention may be embodied in many different forms and should not beconstrued as limited to the embodiments set forth herein; rather, theseembodiments are provided so that this disclosure will satisfy applicablelegal requirements. Like numbers refer to like elements throughout.

Embodiments of the invention are directed to systems, methods, andapparatus for transmitting user prompting information to, mobile deviceoperators (also referred to interchangeably herein as “users” or “mobiledevice users”) and/or receiving feedback information from mobile deviceoperators. The widespread use of mobile devices, such as cellular phonesor smart phones, provides a new and effective channel to reach potentialcustomers to transmit information, such as user prompting information.Moreover, mobile devices provide a relatively simple and convenientmeans from which to receive additional information and/or receivefeedback information from consumers, as well as automatically monitordownstream activities (e.g., consumer behavior, preferences, purchases,etc.) tied to the feedback information transmitted from the mobiledevices.

The term “user prompting information” is used herein to generally referto user interface information such as prompts, inquiries, pre-set userinterfaces, etc. to request feedback information from a mobile deviceuser. Various types of user prompting information may include userinterfaces, prompts, and/or inquiries for voting information (e.g., gameshow or reality television real time voting interfaces, product or brandvoting interfaces, and/or the like), rating information (e.g.,interfaces for rating or ranking products, television show content,radio content, etc., surveys, consumer comment interfaces, and/or thelike), content selection information (e.g., interfaces for selectingbetween items, and/or the like), user preference information (e.g.,interfaces that include prompts or inquiries relating to a user'spreferences, account information, and/or the like). The term “userprompting information” may include location identifiers to identify,reference, or point to a memory location or block of memory (e.g., adatabase at an information source) at which user prompting informationassociated with the tone is stored. In some embodiments of theinvention, a location identifier may include hyperlink or other webaddress information. The term “feedback information” may be anyinformation (e.g., data selections, data entry, etc.) provided to one ormore information sources by the mobile device user in response toreceiving the user prompting information. Various types of feedbackinformation may corresponding to the various types of user promptinginformation and therefore may include user-specific voting information,rating information, content selection information, and/or userpreference information provided by the mobile device user.

As used herein, the term “tone” may refer to a tone carrying informationthat may be communicated or transmitted to a mobile device by a tonetransmission device. The terms “tone” and “information carrying tone”may be used interchangeably herein. A wide variety of methods and/ortechniques may be utilized to facilitate the communication of a tonefrom a tone transmission device to a mobile device. In certainembodiments of the invention, a tone may be output by one or moresuitable output devices associated with the tone transmission device,for example, one or more speakers, and the tone may be received by oneor more suitable input devices associated with the mobile device, forexample, a microphone. A tone may be a wave, such as an elastic wave, aprimary wave or P-wave, that is propagated between the tone transmissiondevice and the mobile device. In certain embodiments of the invention, atone may be a vibration wave that is propagated though a solid, liquid,or gas. For example, in various embodiments of the invention, a tone maybe a sound wave that is emitted or otherwise output by the tonetransmission device for reception by a mobile device. Tones inaccordance with embodiments of the invention may have a wide variety ofdifferent frequencies and/or amplitudes as desired. For example, in someembodiments, a tone may be a sound wave that is within a range that maybe detected by the human ear, for example, a sound wave with a frequencybetween approximately 20 hertz and approximately 20 kilohertz. In suchan example embodiment of the invention, it may be desirable to have thetone be produced at a frequency range that is not detectable by thenaked ear for at least a significant portion of the human population(e.g., a frequency range of 17 kilohertz-20 kilohertz). In otherembodiments, a tone may be a sound wave that is outside the normal rangethat may be detected by the human ear, for example, a sound wave with afrequency above approximately 21 kilohertz. In these embodiments, a tonemay be transmitted to a mobile device without being aurally detected bya user of the mobile device. Once received, the tone may be processed bythe mobile device to extract the information included in the tone.Information embedded in or otherwise carried by the tone can includeuser prompting information such as one or more location identifiers, asdescribed in more detail with reference to FIG. 4.

As used herein, the term “tone transmission device” may be any device,system, apparatus, or combination thereof that facilitates thecommunication of a tone to a mobile device. A tone transmission devicemay facilitate user prompting information messaging by communicatingtones to a mobile device that are associated with various types of userprompting information. Additionally, for purposes of this disclosure,the terms “tone transmission device” and “tone transmission system” maybe used interchangeably. Examples of tone transmission devices include,but are not limited to, devices that are situated within a poster,billboard, etc., devices that are situated within a retail location(e.g., devices situated on the shelves of a grocery store, point of saleterminals, etc.), radios, televisions, computers, projectors, mobiledevices, speaker systems, public broadcast systems, public announcementsystem, etc. Some example tone transmission devices and tonetransmission systems are discussed in greater detail below.

As used herein, the term “mobile device” may refer to any mobile devicethat is operable to receive a tone from a tone transmission device.Mobile devices may be devices that are carried by a target user andinformation, such as user prompting information, may be communicated tothe user via the mobile devices. Examples of mobile devices include, butare not limited to, cellular phones, iPhones, smart phones, personaldigital assistants (PDA's), pagers, digital audio players, handheldportable computing devices, digital tablets, laptop computers, etc.Additionally, for purposes of this disclosure, the terms “mobiledevice,” “mobile communications device,” “mobile phone,” “cellularphone,” and “cell phone” may be used interchangeably.

Various embodiments described herein may include receiving userprompting information on a mobile device and/or receiving feedbackinformation from the mobile device user in response to receiving theuser prompting information. According to one embodiment, thetransmission of user prompting information may be initiated bycommunicating a tone, such as an information carrying tone, to a mobiledevice, whereby the tone includes a location identifier that isassociated with user prompting information. In addition, embodiments mayfurther include transmitting via the mobile device an user's responsesand/or input to the mobile device (e.g., feedback information), whichmay be further processed by one or more information source entities,such as a back-end processor (also referred to herein as an “informationsource” or “information source processor”) capable of maintaininglocation identifiers and associated user prompting information, userprofiles (e.g., consumer account information, user preferences, etc.),and/or feedback information.

Various tone transmission devices may be operable to transmitinformation carrying tones with user prompting information, such as atelevision transmitting audiovisual content including an informationcarrying tone, a radio transmitter transmitting radio content includingan information carrying tone, internet data transmissions including aninformation carrying tone, or a stand-alone tone generation devicehaving the primary purpose to generate and/or transmit informationcarrying tones, such as may be used in retail displays or otheradvertisement displays.

For example, while watching a television broadcast, such as anadvertisement, a message may be played that indicates feedbackinformation may be requested from the viewer via the viewer's mobiledevice. The message may indicate that if the viewer elects to receive aninformation carrying tone being broadcast through the television theymay receive user prompting information (e.g., location identifiersassociated with user prompting information) to enter requested feedbackinformation. Thus, if a viewer so chooses, upon receiving theinformation carrying tone by the mobile device, the mobile device maythen communicate with a back-end processor to receive user promptinginformation for presentation to the mobile device user to allow themobile device user to provide feedback information.

Upon receiving an information carrying tone by the mobile device, themobile device and associated applications can perform processing toextract the user prompting information carried by the tone. In exampleembodiments, the tone may include at least one location identifier orother unique identifier that is associated by a back-end processingsystem with additional user prompting information. Thus, in response toextracting the location identifier from the tone, the mobile device maytransmit a request to another system, such as a back-end processor,merchant, marketer, service provider, financial institution, or otherentity to receive user prompting information associated with thelocation identifier and/or other information that entity wants topresent to the mobile device user. The location identifier or otherunique identifier may facilitate the back-end processor or other entityto identify the associated user prompting information and/or performadditional processing. In one example embodiment, the user may provideinput to the mobile device, such as whether the user wishes to providefeedback information relating to the content associated with the tonesuch as television content or an advertised product or service, orwhether the user wishes to obtain user prompting information to providefeedback information regarding the content or advertised product orservice.

One or more entities can facilitate the generation, retrieval,transmission, processing, and management of user prompting informationusing the information carrying tones and/or the processing andmanagement of feedback information received from the mobile device userin response to the user prompting information. For example, a centralinformation source, such as a back-end processor, may create tones andassociate location identifiers and/or user prompting informationtherewith. A central information source may also facilitate thetransmission of information carrying tones and location identifiers,such as by coordinating with a television or radio broadcaster or byproviding standalone tone transmission devices at merchants or withother marketing media. In some embodiments, a central information sourcemay interact with one or more third party entities, such as a merchants,service providers, marketers, and/or the like. For example, a centralinformation source may communicate with a third party entity (alsoreferred to interchangeably herein as a “third party informationsource”), sending information received from a mobile device inassociation with an information carrying tone, or requesting informationto send to a mobile device. Examples of a central information source orcentral service provider may include a mobile service provider system,or a system or entity associated with a tone processing applicationutilized by the mobile device. For example, First Data Corporation™ mayprovide a central information source that receives and processesrequests for user prompting information and/or feedback informationreceived from mobile devices. Examples of suitable platforms that may beutilized include, but are not limited to, the First Data Mobile GatewayPlatform and the First Data Size Platform.

A wide variety of different systems may be utilized as desired invarious embodiments of the invention to communicate information to amobile device and receive response information from the mobile device. Afew example system are discussed below with reference to FIGS. 1-9.

FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of one example system that may facilitatethe communication of user prompting information to a mobile device andreceiving feedback information from the mobile device, according to anillustrative embodiment of the invention. The system 100 may be utilizedto facilitate the communication of a wide variety of differentinformation to a mobile device 110 through the use of communicating oneor more tones to the mobile device 110. The system 100 may include atone transmission device 105, a mobile device 110, and one or moreinformation sources 115.

The tone transmission device 105 may be any suitable or appropriatedevice or system that facilitates the communication of a tone to amobile device 110. In this regard, the tone transmission device 105 mayfacilitate communicating user prompting information to mobile devices.The tone transmission device 105 may be situated or placed in a widevariety of different locations or environments as desired in variousembodiments of the invention. For example, the tone transmission device105 may be incorporated into or situated proximate to a poster,billboard, sign, or other advertisement. The tone output by the tonetransmission device 105 may be associated with a product or service thatis referenced by the poster, billboard, sign, or other advertisement. Asanother example, the tone transmission device 105 may be situated at amerchant location, such as, a retail establishment. The tonetransmission device 105 may be incorporated into or situated proximateto one or more products at the merchant location. For example, the tonetransmission device 105 may be located on a shelf at the merchantlocation next to a product associated with a tone that is output by thetone transmission device 105 or the tone transmission device 105 may belocated next to or incorporated into a cashier's station or kiosk insidethe merchant location. As another example, the tone transmission device105 may be a speaker system, public announcement system, or publicbroadcasting system that is situated within a merchant location, asporting venue, or other location. As another example, the tonetransmission device 105 may be any conventional television, radio,computer, or projector operable to transmit content, such as videoand/or audio content, as further described with reference to FIG. 3. Asyet another example, the tone transmission device 105 may be a mobiledevice that is operable to communicate a tone to another mobile device110. As another example, the tone transmission device 105 may be aportable audio device (e.g., iPod, portable radio, etc.), a radio, atelevision, or other device that is capable of outputting a tone.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the size and/or dimensions ofthe tone transmission device 105 may be based at least in part on theapplication of the tone transmission device 105. For example, if thetone transmission device 105 is incorporated into a poster, the tonetransmission device 105 may have relatively small dimensions thatfacilitate its incorporation into the poster. As another example, a tonetransmission device 105 that is situated on or near a shelf at amerchant location may have relatively small dimensions. For example, thetone transmission device 105 may have a size that is smaller than orapproximately equal to that of a conventional coupon holder. In yetanother example, the tone transmission device 105 may be anyconventional television, radio, computer, or projector, as furtherdescribed with reference to FIG. 3. Additionally, the tone transmissiondevice 105 may utilize a wide variety of different power sources asdesired in various embodiments of the invention, for example, batterypower, a direct current power source, an alternating current powersource, or a network provided power source (e.g., power provided via atelephone line).

The tone transmission device 105 may be a processor driven device thatfacilitates the outputting and communication of a tone that may bereceived by a mobile device 110. For example, the tone transmissiondevice 105 may include any number of special purpose computers or otherparticular machines, application specific circuits, microcontrollers,personal computers, minicomputers, and/or the like. In certainembodiments, the operations of the tone transmission device 105 may becontrolled by computer-executed or computer-implemented instructionsthat are executed by one or more processors associated with the tonetransmission device 105. The instructions may be embodied in one or moresoftware components as desired in various embodiments of the invention.The execution of the instructions may form a special purpose computer orother particular machine that is operable to communicate a tone to amobile device 110. The one or more processors that control theoperations of the tone transmission device 105 may be incorporated intothe tone transmission device 105 and/or in communication with the tonetransmission device 105 via one or more suitable networks. In certainembodiments of the invention, the operations and/or control of the tonetransmission device 105 may be distributed amongst several processingcomponents.

The tone transmission device 105 may include one or more processors 121,one or more memory devices 122, one or more input/output (I/O)interface(s) 123, and one or more network interface(s) 124. The one ormore memory devices 122 may be any suitable memory devices, for example,caches, read only memory devices, random access memory devices, magneticstorage devices, etc. The one or more memory devices 122 may store data,executable instructions, and/or various program modules utilized by thetone transmission device 105, for example, tone data 125 and/or a tonemanagement application 126. The tone data 125 may include stored dataassociated with a tone that is output by the tone transmission device.In an example embodiment of the invention, tone data may include userprompting information and/or one or more location identifiers associatedwith user prompting information that may make up a portion of the datacarried by the tone (e.g., the tone payload). In other exampleembodiments of the invention, the tone data may include stored digitaldata associated with a tone, such as, a Waveform audio format (WAV)file, MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3 (MP3) file, Moving Picture Experts Group(MPEG) file, Audio Interchange File Format (AIFF) file, Advanced AudioCoding (AAC) file, Apple Lossless file, or other digital media fileformat. As another example, the tone data may include stored analog dataassociated with a tone, for example, magnetically stored analog data.Additionally, in certain embodiments of the invention, data associatedwith a tone may be received by the tone transmission device 105 andoutput by the tone transmission device 105 without being stored in oneor more memory devices 122. Thus, in some embodiments of the inventionthe tone transmission device 105 does not include the one or more memorydevices 122.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the tone transmission device105 may include a tone management application 126. The tone managementapplication 126 may include computer-executable instructions thatfacilitate the management of one or more tones by the tone transmissiondevice 105. For example, the tone management application 126 mayfacilitate and/or control the receipt of tone data or other informationassociated with a tone, the generation of tone data, the storage of tonedata, the accessing of stored tone data, the conversion of tone datainto a form that may be output by the tone transmission device 105,and/or the output of a tone by the tone transmission device 105. Incertain embodiments, the conversion of tone data into a form that may beoutput by the tone transmission device 105 may transform digital tonedata into analog data that may be output by one or more suitable outputdevices, for example, one or more speakers. In certain embodiments ofthe invention, the tone management application 126 may also facilitateand/or control network communication between the tone transmissiondevice 105 and one or more external devices, such as, one or more datasources 120. Although the tone management application 126 is illustratedas a single software component, the tone management application 126 mayinclude any number of software components, modules, and/or applicationsas desired in various embodiments of the invention.

The one or more I/O interfaces 123 may facilitate communication betweenthe tone transmission device 105 and one or more input/output devices,for example, a universal serial bus port, a serial port, a disk drive, aCD-ROM drive, infrared receiver, and/or one or more user interfacedevices, such as, a display, keyboard, keypad, mouse, control panel,touch screen display, remote control, microphone, etc. that facilitateuser interaction with the tone transmission device 105. The one or moreI/O interfaces may be utilized to receive or collect tone data from awide variety of input devices. For example, tone data may be receivedfrom a portable memory device (e.g., thumb drive, portable hard drive,etc.) via the one or more I/O interfaces. Following receipt of the tonedata via the one or more I/O interfaces, the received tone data may beprocessed by the tone management application 126 and stored in a memorydevice 122 associated with the tone transmission device 105.Additionally, in certain embodiments, the one or more I/O interfaces maybe utilized to receive user input from a user of the tone transmissiondevice 105, for example, a programmer of the tone transmission device105. In this regard, one or more user preferences associated with theoperation of the tone transmission device 105 may be received andprocessed. In certain embodiments of the invention, user input may bereceived by the tone transmission device 105 indicating a desire to havea tone output by the tone transmission device 105. For example, a usermay press a button or activate a sensor associated with a tonetransmission device 105, thereby causing the tone transmission device tooutput a tone.

The one or more network interfaces 124 may facilitate connection of thetone transmission device 105 to one or more suitable networks 130, forexample, a local area network, a wide area network, the Internet, atelephone network, a broadcast network, a cellular network, a Bluetoothenabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radio frequency network, any wirednetwork, any wireless network, etc. In this regard, the tonetransmission device 105 may receive tone data and/or user input from oneor more external devices, network components, and/or systems via the oneor more networks 130. For example, the tone transmission device 105 mayreceive tone data from one or more data sources 120 via the one or morenetworks 130. As one example, if the tone transmission device 105 islocated at a merchant location, then the tone transmission device 105may receive tone data from one or more data sources 120 located at themerchant location via a local area network. As another example, if thetone transmission device 105 is a television, then the tone transmissiondevice 105 may receive tone data in association with a televisionsignal, transmission, or broadcast received via a suitable televisionnetwork (e.g., broadcast, cable, satellite, IP television, Internet,etc.). As yet another example, if the tone transmission device 105 is aradio, then the tone transmission device 105 may receive tone data inassociation with a radio signal, transmission, or broadcast via asuitable radio network (e.g., broadcast, satellite, Internet, etc.). Asyet another example, if the tone transmission device 105 is a mobiledevice, then the tone transmission device 105 may receive tone data viacommunication over a cellular network or via an Internet connection.

According to an aspect of the invention, the tone transmission device105 may output a tone for receipt by a mobile device 110. The tonetransmission device 105 may output the tone via one or more suitableoutput devices 128, for example, one or more speakers. In certainembodiments of the invention, the tone management application 126 maydirect and/or control the access of stored tone data 125 and theprocessing of the accessed tone data 125 to derive the tone that isoutput by the one or more output devices 128. For example, digital tonedata 125 may be accessed from memory 122 and processed through adigital-to-analog converter 127 to derive the tone that is output by theone or more output devices 128. In this regard, the stored tone data 125may be transformed into a tone that may be output by the tonetransmission device 105 for receipt by a mobile device. In otherembodiments of the invention, the tone transmission device 105 mayreceive tone data in a broadcast stream, such as a radio or televisionbroadcast stream, and the tone transmission device may output the tonedata as a tone in the audio output of the tone transmission device 105.For example, a television broadcast signal may include embedded toneinformation that is output by one or more speakers of a television aspart of the audio output of the received television broadcast signal.

Embodiments of the invention may include tone transmission devices withmore or less than the components illustrated for the tone transmissiondevice 105 illustrated in FIG. 1. The description of the tonetransmission device 105 of FIG. 1 is provided by way of example only andis not intended to be limiting.

With continued reference to FIG. 1, the mobile device 110 may be anysuitable or appropriate device or system that facilitates the receipt ofa tone from a tone transmission device 105 and the processing of thereceived tone. In this regard, the mobile device 110 may receive userprompting information (e.g., one or more location identifiers thatreference user prompting information associated with the tone) throughthe receipt of one or more tones. The mobile device 110 may facilitatethe receipt of tones from any number of tone transmission devices 105 ina wide variety of different locations or environments as desired invarious embodiments of the invention. Once a tone is received by themobile device 110, the tone may be processed by the mobile device 110 toextract information included in the tone, such as, one or more locationidentifiers that reference user prompting information associated withthe tone. The extracted information may be utilized to access one ormore information sources 115 to obtain at least a portion of the userprompting information associated with the tone.

Tones may be associated with a wide variety of different types of userprompting information that may be accessed by the mobile device 110 fromone or more information sources 115. In example embodiments of theinvention, user prompting information that may be associated with tonesmay include, but is not limited to, one or more user interfacescontaining one or more prompts for voting information, ratinginformation, content selection information, user preference information,and/or the like. Additionally, information extracted from a tone mayfacilitate the connection of the mobile device 110 to a website or othernetwork site for a wide variety of purposes, including but not limitedto, retrieving user prompting information for displaying to the mobiledevice user (e.g., user interfaces including one or more prompts forvoting information, rating information, content selection information,user preference information, and/or the like). The mobile device usermay then enter or otherwise provide feedback information to one or moreinformation sources in response to the receipt of user promptinginformation at the mobile device, as is discussed in more detail withreference to FIGS. 5-6 below.

The mobile device 110 may be a processor driven device that facilitatesthe receipt of tones from tone transmission devices 105 and theprocessing of the received tones. For example, the mobile device 110 mayinclude any number of special purpose computers or other particularmachines, application specific circuits, microcontrollers, and/or thelike. In certain embodiments, at least a portion of the operations ofthe mobile device 110 may be controlled by computer-executed orcomputer-implemented instructions that are executed by one or moreprocessors associated with the mobile device 110. The instructions maybe embodied in one or more software components as desired in variousembodiments of the invention. The execution of the instructions may forma special purpose computer or other particular machine that is operableto receive and process tones. Additionally, in certain embodiments ofthe invention, the operations and/or control of the mobile device 110may be distributed amongst several processing components.

The mobile device 110 may include one or more processors 131, one ormore memory devices 132, one or more input/output (I/O) interface(s)133, and one or more network interface(s) 134. The one or more memorydevices 132 may be any suitable memory devices, for example, caches,read only memory devices, random access memory devices, magnetic storagedevices, etc. The one or more memory devices 132 may store data,executable instructions, and/or various program modules utilized by themobile device 110, for example, stored tone data 135 that is received bythe mobile device 110, an operating system 136, a tone processingapplication 137, and/or a user profile 138. The stored tone data 135 mayinclude user prompting information associated with and/or extracted fromone or more tones that are received by the mobile device 110 and/orpreviously created feedback information. For example, the stored tonedata 135 may include one or more location identifiers that are extractedfrom received tones. As another example, the stored tone data 135 mayinclude user prompting information associated with tones that isreceived from one or more information sources 115.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the mobile device 110 mayinclude one or more software modules, such as an operating system 136and/or a tone processing application 137. The operating system 136 maycontrol the general operation of the mobile device 110, for example, thecompletion of telephone calls, the maintenance of an address book, theaccessing of the Internet via a mobile browser application, etc. Theoperating system 136 may also facilitate the execution of other softwaremodules by the one or more processors 131, for example, the toneprocessing application 137. The tone processing application 137 mayinclude computer-executable instructions that facilitate the receipt andprocessing of one or more tones by the mobile device 110. For example,the tone processing application 137 may facilitate and/or control thereceipt of tones from one or more tone transmission devices 105, theprocessing of received tones to extract user prompting information suchas one or more location identifiers associated with the tones, thecommunication of requests for user prompting information associated witha tone from one or more information sources 115, the receipt of userprompting information from one or more information sources 115, theprocessing of received user prompting information, the storage ofreceived user prompting information, and/or the subsequent access and/orprocessing of stored user prompting information. In certain embodimentsof the invention, the tone processing application 137 may alsofacilitate and/or control network communication between the mobiledevice 110 and one or more external devices, such as, one or moreinformation sources 115. Although the tone processing application 137 isillustrated as a single software component, the tone processingapplication 137 may include any number of software components, modules,and/or applications as desired in various embodiments of the invention.

The user profile 138 may include one or more preferences and/or otherinformation associated with one or more users of the mobile device 110.In certain embodiments, the user profile 138 may include one or moreuser preferences associated with types of desired tones (e.g., tonescarrying user prompting information such as location identifiers) and/oruser prompting information that may be received and processed by themobile device 110. For example, the user profile 138 may includepreferences indicating that certain tones and/or user promptinginformation should be or should not be received and/or processed by themobile device 110. In this regard, tones and/or user promptinginformation may be filtered by the mobile device 110. A wide variety ofdifferent preferences and/or criteria may be utilized as desired invarious embodiments, including but not limited to, merchant criteria,merchant class or merchant type criteria, broadcaster criteria,marketing source criteria, etc. As another example, the user profile 138may include one or more preferences associated with the manner in whichtones and/or user prompting information should be processed by themobile device 110. Moreover, according to one embodiment, the userprofile 138 may include information (e.g., identifying information,user-specific feedback information, etc.) associated with the user ofthe mobile device 110, such as, but not limited to, name information,username, account information, passwords, personal identificationnumbers (PINs), user preference information, user-specific votinginformation, user-specific rating information, user-specific contentselection information, and/or the like. In example embodiments of theinvention, the user profile 138 of the mobile device 110 may storeidentifying information associated with the mobile device, such as amobile device number, universal integrated circuit card (UICC)identifier, a unique device identifier (UDID), subscriber identitymodule (SIM) card identifier, or international mobile subscriberidentity (IMSI) number, or identifying information associated with themobile device user, such as an email address, identification number,home address, area code, zip code, phone number, and/or otherinformation associated with the mobile device and/or mobile device userthat would be useful in user prompting information and/or feedbackprocessing. In some embodiments of the invention, the information storedin the user profile 138 may be used to automatically provide feedbackinformation in response to user prompting information received by themobile device 110.

The one or more I/O interfaces 133 may facilitate communication betweenthe mobile device 110 and one or more input/output devices, for example,one or more user interface devices, such as, a display, keypad, controlpanel, touch screen display, remote control, microphone, etc. thatfacilitate user interaction with the mobile device 110. In this regard,one or more user preferences associated with the operation of the mobiledevice 110 may be received, stored, and/or processed and/or feedbackinformation associated with received user prompting information may bereceived, stored, and/or processed.

The one or more network interfaces 134 may facilitate connection of themobile device 110 to one or more suitable networks 140, for example, acellular network, a local area network, a wide area network, theInternet, a Bluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radiofrequency network, any wired network, any wireless network, etc. In thisregard, the mobile device 110 may receive user prompting information ordata associated with tones from one or more external devices, networkcomponents, and/or systems via the one or more networks 140. The mobiledevice 110 may then process the received user prompting information andcommunicate with the one or more external devices, network components,and/or systems via the one or more networks 140. For example, the mobiledevice 110 may receive a tone from a tone transmission device 105 andextract one or more location identifiers from the received tone. Themobile device 110 may utilize the one or more extracted locationidentifiers to access one or more information sources 115 via a cellularnetwork or mobile Internet browser and receive user promptinginformation associated with the tone. The mobile device 110 may utilizea wide variety of different techniques, methods, and/or systems tocommunicate with the one or more information sources 115. For example, amobile Internet browser or other specific purpose or dedicatedapplication may facilitate communication between the mobile device 110and the one or more information sources 115. As another example, shortmessage service (SMS) communications may be utilized to facilitatecommunication between the mobile device 110 and the one or moreinformation sources 115.

According to an example embodiment of the invention, the mobile device110 may receive and process one or more tones from any number of tonetransmission devices 105. A tone may be output by a tone transmissiondevice 105 and the mobile device 110 may identify and receive the outputtone within a predetermined distance or range “d” from the tonetransmission device 105. A tone transmission device 105 may have a widevariety of different ranges as desired in various embodiments of theinvention, for example, a range of approximately three feet. In certainembodiments of the invention, the tone processing application 137 of themobile device 110 may control the receipt of tones by the mobile device110. For example, a setting or option associated with the toneprocessing application 137 may control the receipt of tones by themobile device 110. When a user indicates that the setting or optionshould be set to allow tones to be received, the receipt of tones may befacilitated by the mobile device 110. However, when a user indicatesthat the setting or option should be set to disallow the receipt oftones, then the mobile device 110 will not process any tones output by atone transmission device 105. In some embodiments, tones may be receivedand processed when a user of the mobile device opens, executes, or“leaves on” the tone processing application 137. In other embodiments,tones may be received and processed only when a user selects an optionwithin the tone processing application 137 indicating that tones shouldbe received.

The mobile device 110 may include one or more input devices thatfacilitate the receipt of tones. For example, a microphone 141associated with the mobile device 110 may be utilized to receive tonesthat have been output by one or more speakers associated with a tonetransmission device 105. After being received by the microphone 141, atone may be passed through one or more filters, for example, one or moreband pass filters that facilitate the isolation of the tone from othertransmissions received by the microphone 141. The filtered tone may thenbe passed through one or more analog-to-digital converters 143 prior tobeing communicated to the one or more mobile device processors 131. Inthis regard, an analog tone may be transformed into digital informationthat may be processed by the tone processing application 137. The toneprocessing application 137 may process the digital informationassociated with the tone, and the tone processing application 137 mayextract user prompting information such as one or more locationidentifiers and/or other data associated with the tone. In certainembodiments of the invention, the tone processing application 137 mayfurther filter the received digital information with one or more digitalfilters or software filters.

In an example embodiment of the invention, once one or more locationidentifiers have been extracted by the tone processing application 137,the tone processing application 137 may utilize the one or more locationidentifiers to receive user prompting information associated with thetone, for example, user interfaces that include one or more promptsrelating to voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, and/or the like. The one ormore location identifiers may facilitate the identification of one ormore information sources 115 from which user prompting informationassociated with the tone may be received. The tone processingapplication 137 may direct the communication of a request for the userprompting information to at least one information source 115 via asuitable network 140. The request may include at least one locationidentifier, an identifier of the user of the mobile device 110 (e.g., auser identification number, account number, or the like), and/or anidentifier of the mobile device 110, for example, a telephone numberassociated with the mobile device 110, a universal integrated circuitcard (UICC) identifier, a unique device identifier (UDID), a subscriberidentity module (SIM) card identifier, an international mobilesubscriber identity (IMSI) number associated with the mobile device 110,or any other identifier that facilitates communication with aninformation source (e.g., a First Data Mobile Gateway identifier).Responsive to the request, the mobile device 110 may receive therequested user prompting information associated with the tone via thenetwork 140. The tone processing application 137 may process at least aportion of the received user prompting information. Additionally, thetone processing application 137 may direct the storage of the one ormore location identifiers and/or the received user prompting informationin the memory 132 of the mobile device 110. As desired, at least aportion of the received user prompting information may be presented oroutput to a user of the mobile device 110 via one or more suitableoutput devices associated with the mobile device 110, for example, adisplay, speaker, headset, or an output device external to the mobiledevice 110.

The user prompting information associated with a tone may be utilized bya mobile device 110 for a wide variety of different purposes as desiredin various embodiments of the invention. For example, user promptinginformation may include one or more prompts for voting information,rating information, content selection information, user preferenceinformation, and/or the like, and/or the like to be output to the mobiledevice user. At least a portion of the user prompting information may beformatted for and displayed to a user of the mobile device 110 via asuitable output device associated with the mobile device 110 (e.g., anLCD display). As another example, user prompting information mayfacilitate a mobile device user providing feedback information inresponse to the displayed user prompting information. Hence, user inputassociated with the user prompting information may be received andprocessed at the mobile device. Such feedback information may betransmitted to one or more information sources for additionalprocessing, as discussed in further detail with reference to FIGS. 5-6below. In other embodiments, the feedback information may be stored bythe mobile device 110 and utilized in a subsequent transaction.

Embodiments of the invention may include mobile devices 110 with more orless than the components illustrated for the mobile device 110illustrated in FIG. 1. The description of the mobile device 110 of FIG.1 is provided by way of example only and is not intended to be limiting.

With continued reference to FIG. 1, the system 100 may include anynumber of information sources 115 that are operable to provide userprompting information associated with tones to a mobile device and/orreceive feedback information from mobile devices and/or mobile deviceusers. The user prompting information may be communicated to a mobiledevice 110 by an information source 115 in response to a request for theuser prompting information. In certain embodiments of the invention, amobile device 110 may communicate requests for user promptinginformation and/or response messages containing feedback informationdirectly to any number of information sources 115. In other embodiments,the mobile device 110 may communicate requests to a single informationsource or a central information source. The central information sourcemay communicate with other information sources as desired in variousembodiments of the invention and collect user prompting information thatis communicated to the mobile device 110 and/or deliver feedbackinformation received from the mobile device 110 to other informationsources. Additionally or alternatively, the central information sourcemay establish direct communication between the mobile device 110 andanother information source, for example, via handing off a networksession between the mobile device 110 and the central information sourceto another information source.

An information source 115 may be a processor driven device or networkentity that facilitates the receipt of a request for user promptinginformation or data associated with a tone, the accessing of the userprompting information, and the communication of the user promptinginformation to another component of the system 100 in response to thereceived request for the user prompting information. For example, theuser prompting information may be communicated to the mobile device 110or to another information source 115 in response to a request for theuser prompting information. The information source 115 may include anynumber of processors and/or processing components as desired in variousembodiments of the invention. For example, the information source 115may include any number of special purpose computers or other particularmachines, application specific circuits, microcontrollers, personalcomputers, servers, and/or the like. In certain embodiments, at least aportion of the operations of the information source 115 may becontrolled by computer-executed or computer-implemented instructionsthat are executed by one or more processors associated with theinformation source 115. The instructions may be embodied in one or moresoftware components as desired in various embodiments of the invention.The execution of the instructions may form a special purpose computer orother particular machine that is operable to receive and processrequests for user prompting information associated with tones and/orreceive and process feedback information received in response to theuser prompting information. Additionally, in certain embodiments of theinvention, the operations and/or control of the information source 115may be distributed amongst several processing components.

The information source 115 may include one or more processors 151, oneor more memory devices 152, one or more input/output (I/O) interface(s)153, and one or more network interface(s) 154. The one or more memorydevices 152 may be any suitable memory devices, for example, caches,read only memory devices, random access memory devices, magnetic storagedevices, databases, etc. The one or more memory devices 152 may storedata, executable instructions, and/or various program modules utilizedby the information source 115, for example, stored user prompting data155 associated with tones, an operating system 156, user profiles 158,and/or a feedback information processing module 157. The stored userprompting data 155 may include any user prompting information associatedwith a tone that may be received by a mobile device 110.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the information source 115 mayinclude one or more software modules, such as an operating system 156and/or a user prompting module 157. The operating system 156 may controlthe general operation of the information source 115 and may facilitatethe execution of other software modules by the one or more processors151, for example, the execution of the user prompting module 157. Theuser prompting module 157 may include computer-executable instructionsthat facilitate the receipt and processing of one or more requests foruser prompting information associated with tones. For example, the userprompting module 157 may facilitate and/or control the receipt, from oneor more mobile devices 110 and/or other information sources, of requestsfor user prompting information associated with tones, the processing ofthe received requests to access the user prompting information, and thecommunication of the user prompting information to the requestingentity. Additionally, the user prompting module 157 may facilitateand/or control network communication between the information source 115and one or more external devices, such as, a mobile device 110 and/orother information sources. Although the user prompting module 157 isillustrated as a single software component, the user prompting module157 may include any number of software components, modules, and/orapplications as desired in various embodiments of the invention.

A request for user prompting information associated with a tone mayinclude one or more location identifiers and/or other unique identifiersthat have been extracted from the tone by the mobile device 110.Additionally, the request may include an identifier of the mobile device110 and/or an identifier of the user of the mobile device. The userprompting module 157 may receive the request and process the request toextract the one or more location identifiers, the identifier of themobile device 110, and/or the identifier of the user of the mobiledevice. In other words, the received request may be transformed by theuser prompting module 157 into data that is representative of the one ormore location identifiers, the identifier of the mobile device 110,and/or the identifier of the user of the mobile device. The one or morelocation identifiers, the identifier of the mobile device 110, and/orthe identifier of the user of the mobile device may be utilized toaccess user prompting information associated with a tone.

For example, a location identifier may be utilized to search for userprompting information associated with a tone that is stored in a memory152 of the information source. In certain embodiments, a locationidentifier may function as a pointer to stored user promptinginformation. As another example, a location identifier may be utilizedin the generation of a request for user prompting information that iscommunicated to another information source, such as a third partyinformation source. One or more location identifiers may reference otherinformation sources and/or memory locations associated with the otherinformation sources. The user prompting module 157 may generate arequest for user prompting information and communicate the request tothe other information sources. The request may be processed by a hostmodule of the other information sources and the requested user promptinginformation may be communicated to the requesting user prompting module157. Once the user prompting information has been obtained by the userprompting module 157, at least a portion of the user promptinginformation may be communicated by the user prompting module 157 to themobile device 110 via one or more suitable networks 140.

The information source(s) 115 may include (or have access to) userprofiles 158. In example embodiments of the invention, the user profiles158 may store identifying information associated with one or more mobiledevices, such as mobile device numbers, UICC identifiers, UDIDidentifiers, SIM card identifiers, or IMSI numbers, or identifyinginformation associated with mobile device users, such as name, emailaddress, username, identification number, an account number, homeaddress, area code, zip code, phone number, and/or other informationassociated with the mobile device and/or mobile device user that wouldbe useful in providing user prompting information and/or additionalcontent to the mobile device user (e.g., previous feedback informationprovided by a particular mobile device user, etc.). In certainembodiments, a user profile 158 may include one or more user preferencesassociated with types of desired tones and/or user prompting informationthat may be requested from and/or processed by the information source115. For example, the user profile 158 may include preferencesindicating that certain tones and/or user prompting information shouldbe or should not be transmitted to a particular mobile device userand/or processed by the information source 115. In this regard, tonesand/or user prompting information may be filtered by the informationsource 115. A wide variety of different preferences and/or criteria maybe utilized as desired in various embodiments, including but not limitedto, merchant criteria, merchant class or merchant type criteria,broadcaster criteria, marketing source criteria, etc. As anotherexample, the user profile 158 may include one or more preferencesassociated with the manner in which tones and/or user promptinginformation should be transmitted to a particular mobile device userand/or processed by the information source(s) 115.

In other embodiments of the invention, a user profile 158 may includeuser prompting information and/or feedback information specific to aparticular “user” (e.g., the mobile device or mobile device user). In anexample embodiment of the invention, other information may also bestored in the user profile 158, such as transaction history information,previous feedback information supplied, and/or other information. Suchuser-specific information may be utilized to provide additional content(e.g., media content, advertisements, etc.) to the mobile device userand/or additional user prompting information. In some embodiments of theinvention a user's user profile 158 may be accessible via a website orother user interface, thereby allowing the consumer to monitor theirprevious transactions and/or previously submitted feedback informationvia the Internet and/or various user interface access point (e.g.,kiosks, etc.).

The one or more I/O interfaces 153 may facilitate communication betweenthe information source 115 and one or more input/output devices, forexample, a keyboard, mouse, display, keypad, control panel, touch screendisplay, remote control, microphone, disc drive, CD-ROM drive, infraredreceiver, a device connected via a universal serial bus (USB) port, adevice connected via a serial port, etc. In this regard, inputassociated with the operation of the information source 115 be receivedand information processed by the information source 115 may be output.

The one or more network interfaces 154 may facilitate connection of theinformation source 115 to one or more suitable networks 140, forexample, a cellular network, a local area network, a wide area network,the Internet, a Bluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radiofrequency network, any wired network, any wireless network, etc. In thisregard, the information source 115 may receive requests for userprompting information and may communicate the user prompting informationto a requesting mobile device 110. Additionally, the information source115 may communicate with other information sources as desired. Theinformation source 115 may utilize a wide variety of differenttechniques, methods, and/or systems to communicate with a mobile device110 and/or with other information sources. For example, a web server orother specific purpose or dedicated application may facilitatecommunication between the information source 115 and the mobile device110. As another example, short message service (SMS) communications maybe utilized to facilitate communication between the information source115 and the mobile device 110.

Embodiments of the invention may include information sources 115 withmore or less than the components illustrated for the information source115 illustrated in FIG. 1. The description of the information source 115of FIG. 1 is provided by way of example only and is not intended to belimiting.

In certain embodiments of the invention, at least a portion of the userprompting information associated with a tone may be stored by a mobiledevice 110 prior to the receipt of the tone by the mobile device 110(e.g., as part of a software application existing on the mobile device).The tone processing application 137 of the mobile device may process thereceived tone to extract one or more location identifiers, and the oneor more extracted location identifiers may be utilized to access atleast a portion of the prestored information. The user promptinginformation may be received by and prestored on the mobile device 110utilizing a wide variety of different techniques or methods as desired.For example, the user prompting information may be received from aninformation source via one or more suitable networks, for example, aBluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Fi network, an RFID network, cellularnetwork, Internet connection, etc. The receipt, storage, subsequentaccess, and/or subsequent processing of the user prompting informationmay be managed by the tone processing application 137 in certainembodiments of invention. In this example, a user may be provided withuser prompting information that is stored on the mobile device 110, suchas when encountering one or more tone transmission devices 105, forexample, when listening to the radio, when shopping at a retail outlet,or when watching television content.

With continued reference to FIG. 1, the system 100 may include anynumber of data sources 120 that are operable to communicate or otherwiseprovide tone data to the tone transmission device 105. In certainembodiments of the invention, a data source 120 may communicate tonedata to the tone transmission device 105 via one or more suitablenetworks 130. Tone data may be communicated to a tone transmissiondevice 105 in response to the receipt, from the tone transmission device105, of a request for the tone data. Alternatively, a data source 120may push or otherwise communicate tone data to the tone transmissiondevice 105 without the tone data being requested. For example, in amerchant location, a data source 120 may push tone data associated witha product to a tone transmission device 105 situated proximate to theproduct. As another example, a data source 120 may include abroadcasting entity that incorporates tone data into broadcastinformation, such as a radio or television broadcast, that iscommunicated to a radio or television that functions as a tonetransmission device, such as is described with reference to FIG. 3.According to one example embodiment, the data source 120 can be acomponent of an information source 115, or otherwise associated with asame entity as an information source 115, such as a back-end processorfacilitating communications associated with information carrying tonesand/or user prompting and/or feedback information communications.

A data source 120 may be a processor driven device or network entitythat facilitates the communication tone data to another component of thesystem 100, for example, a tone transmission device 105 or another datasource 120. The data source 120 may include any number of processorsand/or processing components as desired in various embodiments of theinvention. For example, the data source 120 may include any number ofspecial purpose computers or other particular machines, applicationspecific circuits, microcontrollers, personal computers, servers, and/orthe like. In certain embodiments, at least a portion of the operationsof the data source 120 may be controlled by computer-executed orcomputer-implemented instructions that are executed by one or moreprocessors associated with the data source 120. The instructions may beembodied in one or more software components as desired in variousembodiments of the invention. The execution of the instructions may forma special purpose computer or other particular machine that is operableto communicate tone data. Additionally, in certain embodiments of theinvention, the operations and/or control of the data source 120 may bedistributed amongst several processing components.

The data source 120 may include one or more processors 161, one or morememory devices 162, one or more input/output (I/O) interface(s) 163, andone or more network interface(s) 164. The one or more memory devices 162may be any suitable memory devices, for example, caches, read onlymemory devices, random access memory devices, magnetic storage devices,databases, etc. The one or more memory devices 162 may store data,executable instructions, and/or various program modules utilized by thedata source 120, for example, tone data 165 associated with tones, anoperating system 166, and/or a host module 167. The stored tone data 165may include stored data associated with a tone that is communicated to atone transmission device 105 for output by the tone transmission device105. For example, the stored tone data 165 may include stored digitaldata associated with a tone, such as, a WAV file, MP3 file, MPEG file,AIFF file, AAC file, Apple Lossless file, or other digital media fileformat.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the data source 120 may includeone or more software modules, such as an operating system 166 and/or ahost module 167. The operating system 166 may control the generaloperation of the data source 120 and may facilitate the execution ofother software modules by the one or more processors 161, for example,the execution of the host module 167. The host module 167 may includecomputer-executable instructions that facilitate the communication oftone data 165 to a tone transmission device 105. For example, the hostmodule 167 may facilitate and/or control the receipt, from a tonetransmission device 105, of a request for tone data 165, the processingof the received requests to access the tone data 165, and/or thecommunication of tone data 165 to the tone transmission device 105. Asanother example, the host module 167 may facilitate the establishment ofa network session or other communication with the tone transmissiondevice 105, and the host module 167 may direct the communication ortransmission of tone data 165 to the tone transmission device 105. Thehost module 167 may also facilitate and/or control network communicationbetween the data source 120 and one or more other data sources. Althoughthe host module 167 is illustrated as a single software component, thehost module 167 may include any number of software components, modules,and/or applications as desired in various embodiments of the invention.

The one or more I/O interfaces 163 may facilitate communication betweenthe data source 120 and one or more input/output devices, for example, akeyboard, mouse, display, keypad, control panel, touch screen display,remote control, microphone, disc drive, CD-ROM drive, infrared receiver,a device connected via a universal serial bus (USB) port, a deviceconnected via a serial port, etc. In this regard, input associated withthe operation of the data source 120 may be received and informationprocessed by the data source 120 may be output.

The one or more network interfaces 164 may facilitate connection of thedata source 120 to one or more suitable networks 130, for example, alocal area network, a wide area network, the Internet, a cellularnetwork, a television broadcast network, a television cable network, atelevision satellite network, a radio broadcast network, a Bluetoothenabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radio frequency network, any wirednetwork, any wireless network, etc. In this regard, the data source 120may communicate tone data 125 to a tone transmission device 105.Additionally, the data source 120 may communicate with other datasources as desired in various embodiments of the invention. For example,a first data source 120 may receive tone data 125 from a second datasource 120, and the first data source 120 may communicate the receivedtone data 125 to the tone transmission device 105.

Embodiments of the invention may include data sources 120 with more orless than the components illustrated for the data source 120 illustratedin FIG. 1. The description of the data source 120 of FIG. 1 is providedby way of example only and is not intended to be limiting. Additionally,in certain embodiments, a data source 120 and an information source 115may be the same device or system.

Although FIG. 1 has been described as having specific functionsperformed by specific components of the system 100, various functionsand/or operations of embodiments of the invention may be performed byany suitable component of the system 100. In certain embodiments,various functions and/or operations that are described as beingperformed by multiple components may be performed by a single componentof the system 100. For example, a tone transmission device 105 may alsofunction as an information source 115. Additionally, various operationsmay be completed in a distributed manner by multiple components of thesystem 100.

Additionally, certain components of the system 100 are described ashaving any number of processors or processing components. Operations maybe completed by the one or more processors as desired in variousembodiments of the invention. A different processor may be provided tocomplete or facilitate each operation of a system component, oralternatively, multiple operations may be completed or facilitated by asingle processor. For example, a first processor of the mobile device110 may facilitate the processing of a received tone to extract one ormore location identifiers associated with the tone; a second processormay facilitate the storage of the extracted one or more locationidentifiers; a third processor may facilitate the communication of arequest for user prompting information associated with the tone to oneor more information sources; and a fourth processor may facilitate thereceipt of the requested user prompting information from the one or moreinformation sources and/or the processing of feedback informationreceived from a mobile device user in response to receiving the userprompting information at the mobile device. As desired, two or more ofthe first, second, third, and fourth processors may be the sameprocessor. The operations of other components of the system 100 may, insome embodiments of the invention, be completed and/or facilitated in asimilar distributed manner.

FIG. 2 is a diagram of one example data flow 200 of transmitting aninformation carrying tone and retrieving user prompting informationassociated with the tone, according to an illustrative embodiment of theinvention. The data flow 200 may be applicable to a wide variety ofsystems utilized to communicate tones to a mobile device, including butnot limited to, the system 100 illustrated in FIG. 1.

With reference to FIG. 2, a tone data source 205 may communicate aninformation carrying tone 210 to a tone transmission device 215. Thetone transmission device 215 may include any device that is capable ofcommunicating or outputting the tone 210 to the mobile device 220, suchas any tone transmission device 105 described with reference to FIG. 1,for example. The tone data source 205 may include any device or numberof devices that are capable of communicating a tone 210 or userprompting information associated with a tone (e.g., one or more locationidentifiers) to the tone transmission device 215, such as any tone datasource 120 describe with reference to FIG. 1, for example. In variousembodiments of the invention, the tone data source 205 may communicate atone 210 or user prompting information associated with a tone (e.g., oneor more location identifiers) to the tone transmission device 215 inresponse to a request that is received from the tone transmission device215. In other embodiments of the invention, the tone data source 205 mayproactively push the tone 210 or user prompting information associatedwith a tone to the tone transmission device 215 via a suitable network.In still other embodiments of the invention, the tone data source 205may output one or more tones via one or more suitable output devices,such as one or more speakers, and the one or more tones, may be receivedand processed by the tone transmission device 215. The one or more tonesoutput by the tone data source 205 may include the tone 210 and/or userprompting information associated with a tone (e.g., one or more locationidentifiers).

Although FIG. 2 illustrates the tone data source 205 as communicating atone 210 to the tone transmission device 215, in various embodiments ofthe invention, the tone data source 205 may communicate user promptinginformation associated with the tone 210 to the tone transmission device215, and the tone transmission device 215 may utilize a portion or allof the received user prompting information to generate the tone 210 thatis to be output by the tone transmission device 215.

Additionally, in various embodiments of the invention, the tone 210and/or user prompting information associated with the tone 210 may bestored by the tone transmission device 215 in one or more suitablememory devices 216, for example, one or more caches, read only memorydevices, random access memory devices, magnetic storage devices, etc. Incertain embodiments, the tone 210 or user prompting informationassociated with the tone 210 may be accessed from the one or more memorydevices 216 and output by the tone transmission device 215.Additionally, in certain embodiments, user prompting informationassociated with the tone 210 may be utilized by the tone transmissiondevice 215 to generate the tone 210 to be output.

In certain embodiments of the invention, the tone 210 may becommunicated from the tone transmission device 215 to the mobile device220 by being output from one or more suitable output devices associatedwith the tone transmission device 215, for example, one or morespeakers. In certain embodiments, the tone 210 may be output by the tonetransmission device 215 in response to a request that is received fromthe mobile device 220. In other embodiments, the tone 210 may beproactively output by the tone transmission device 215 for reception bythe mobile device 220. For example, the tone 210 may be periodicallyoutput by the tone transmission device 215 at regular time intervals,such as, every 5 seconds, every 10 seconds, every 15 seconds, etc. Asanother example, the tone 210 may be continuously output by the tonetransmission device 215 in a loop. In other embodiments of theinvention, the tone 210 may be output by the tone transmission device215 based upon the receipt of user input to output the tone 210.

After being output by the tone transmission device 215, the tone 210 maybe received by the mobile device 220. According to an aspect of theinvention, the tone 210 may be received by a microphone associated withthe mobile device 220. After being received by a microphone, the tone210 may be processed through one or more filters (e.g., band passfilters) as desired and converted into digital data utilizing ananalog-to-digital converter. The digital data from the tone 210 may beprocessed by one or more appropriate software modules and/or softwareapplications associated with the mobile device 220, for example, thetone processing application 137 as described above with reference toFIG. 1. One or more location identifiers (and/or other user promptinginformation) may be extracted from the digital data by the mobile device220. Additionally, as desired in various embodiments of the invention,the received tone 210, digital data, and/or the one or more extractedlocation identifiers (and/or other user prompting information) may bestored in one or more suitable memory devices 221 associated with themobile device 220, for example, one or more caches, read only memorydevices, random access memory devices, etc.

In an example embodiment of the invention, the mobile device 220 mayutilize the one or more extracted location identifiers to request userprompting information associated with the tone 210 from one or moreinformation sources 230. The mobile device 220 may generate a request225 for user prompting information associated with the tone 210, and themobile device 220 may communicate the request 225 to one or moreinformation sources 230. The request 225 may include one or more of theextracted location identifiers, an identifier of the user of the mobiledevice 220, and/or an identifier of the mobile device 220, for example,a universal integrated circuit card (UICC) identifier, a unique deviceidentifier (UDID), a subscriber identity module (SIM) card identifier,an international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI) number associatedwith the mobile device 220, or any other identifier that facilitatescommunication with an information source (e.g., a First Data MobileGateway identifier). In certain embodiments, the mobile device 220 maycommunicate with a central information source 230 when requesting userprompting information associated with a tone 210. In certain otherembodiments, one or more of the location identifiers may identify one ormore information sources that the mobile device 220 will communicatewith in order to request user prompting information associated with atone 210. In other embodiments, the mobile device 220 may initiallycommunicate with a central information source 230 and a communicationsession may be passed off by the central information source 230 toanother information source. In yet other embodiments, the mobile device220 may initially communicate with a central information source 230 andthe central information source 230 may establish communication sessionsbetween the mobile device 220 and one or more other information sources.FIG. 2 illustrates the mobile device 220 communicating with a singleinformation source 230 to request user prompting information associatedwith a tone 210; however, the mobile device 220 may communicate with anynumber of information sources 230, 240 as desired in other embodimentsof the invention to request user prompting information and/or to providefeedback information in response to user prompting information receivedat the mobile device.

The request 225 for user prompting information associated with a tone210 may be communicated from a mobile device 220 to an informationsource 230 via one or more suitable networks, for example, a cellularnetwork, a local area network, a wide area network, the Internet, aBluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radio frequency network,any wired network, any wireless network, etc. The request 225 may bereceived and processed by the information source 230. The informationsource 230 may utilize one or more of the location identifiers to accessuser prompting information 235 associated with the tone 210 from anynumber of suitable memory devices 231 associated with the informationsource, for example, caches, read only memory devices, random accessmemory devices, magnetic storage devices, databases, etc.

Additionally, in certain embodiments of the invention, the informationsource 230 may communicate a request 245 for user prompting informationassociated with the tone 210 to one or more third party informationsources 240, such as is further described with reference to FIG. 7, forexample. The one or more third party information sources 240 may beidentified by the information source 230 from one or more of thelocation identifiers extracted from the tone 210 by the mobile device220. The request 245 that is communicated to the one or more third partyinformation sources 240 may include one or more location identifiersextracted from the tone 210 and/or an identifier of the informationsource 240. Communication between the information source 230 and the oneor more third party information sources 240 may be facilitated via oneor more suitable networks, for example, a local area network, a widearea network, the Internet, a Bluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Finetwork, a radio frequency network, any wired network, any wirelessnetwork, etc.

A third party information source 240 may receive and process a request245 for user prompting information from the information source 230. Thethird party information source 240 may utilize one or more of thelocation identifiers to access user prompting information 250 associatedwith the tone 210 from any number of suitable memory devices 241associated with the third party information source 240, for example,caches, read only memory devices, random access memory devices, magneticstorage devices, databases, etc. The third party information source 240may then communicate the accessed user prompting information 250 to theinformation source 230 via the one or more suitable networks in responseto the request 245. The information source 230 may receive the userprompting information 250 from the third party information source 240.In some embodiments, user prompting information 250 may be received bythe information source 230 from multiple third party information sources240, and the information source 230 may combine the received userprompting information 250 to generate the user prompting information 235that will be communicated to the mobile device 220. Additionally, asdesired in various embodiments, user prompting information 250 receivedfrom third party information sources 240 may be combined with other userprompting information accessed by the information source 230. Whencombining information received and/or accessed from various sources, theinformation source 230 may extract duplicate information and/or resolveconflicts between conflicting information as desired in variousembodiments. In this regard, the user prompting information 235 to becommunicated to the mobile device 220 may be formatted for communicationto the mobile device 220.

Once the user prompting information 235 associated with the tone 210 hasbeen accessed and/or received by the information source 230, theinformation source 230 may communicate the user prompting information235 to the mobile device 220 in response to the request 225 for userprompting information that was received from the mobile device 220. Incertain embodiments, the information source 230 may store various dataassociated with a request for user prompting information 235 that isreceived from the mobile device 220. For example, the information source230 may store an indication that the mobile device 220 requested theuser prompting information 235 and/or an indication that the userprompting information 235 was communicated to the mobile device 220. Inthis regard, tone activity for a user of the mobile device 220 may betracked by the information source 230.

The mobile device 220 may receive the user prompting information 235from the information source 230. As desired in various embodiments, themobile device 220 may output at least a portion of the user promptinginformation to a user of the mobile device 220 via one or more suitableoutput devices, for example, a display of the mobile device 220.Additionally, as desired in various embodiments, the mobile device 220may store a portion or all of the received user prompting information235 in memory 221. As an example, user prompting information, such asprompts for voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, and/or the like, associatedwith the tone 210 may be displayed to the user. In certain embodiments,the mobile device 220 may utilize at least a portion of the userprompting information 235 to communicate with another entity. Forexample, the user prompting information 235 may include a link, such asa hyperlink, that facilitates the establishment of communication betweenthe mobile device 220 and another entity, such as, information source220, 240, or another entity, system, or device associated with the tone210. In this regard, the mobile device 220 may be utilized to accessother information associated with the tone 210, for example, a websitethat includes user prompting information. Additionally, in variousembodiments of the invention, in response to outputting user promptinformation at the mobile device, the mobile device 220 user may providevarious types of feedback information via the I/O interfaces of themobile device 220, which may then be transmitted to one or moreinformation sources 230 and/or third party information sources 240 foradditional processing. The creation, receipt, and processing of feedbackinformation provided by the mobile device user is discussed in furtherdetail below with reference to FIGS. 5-6.

Many variations may be made to the data flow 200 illustrated in FIG. 2as desired in various embodiments of the invention. The data flow 200 isnot intended to be limiting, but instead is provided by way of exampleonly as an illustrative embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of yet another example system 300 that mayfacilitate the communication of information to a mobile device 315 via atone transmission device 310 operable to communicate a broadcast signal,such as a television or radio signal, according to an illustrativeembodiment of the invention. Accordingly, the system of FIG. 3 mayfacilitate the communication of one or more information carrying tonesto a tone transmission device 310 via a broadcast signal, for example, aradio or television broadcast.

With reference to FIG. 3, the system 300 may include a broadcast entity305, a tone transmission device 310, and a mobile device 315. Thebroadcast entity 305 may be operable to generate a broadcast signal or abroadcast stream that is communicated directly and/or indirectly to anynumber of tone transmission devices 310. Examples of broadcast companiesinclude, but are not limited to, television networks, televisionbroadcast companies, radio stations, etc. Examples of broadcast signalsinclude, but are not limited to, television broadcast signals, radiobroadcast signals, Internet content, etc.

The tone transmission device 310 according to this embodiment may be anysuitable device that is operable to receive a broadcast signal andoutput at least a portion of the received broadcast signal to one ormore users. Examples of tone transmission devices 310 include, but arenot limited to, televisions, radios, television antennas, cable boxes,satellite television receivers, satellite radios, any combination ofthese devices (e.g., a television and a cable box), etc.

As desired in various embodiments of the invention, one or more tonesmay be included in a broadcast signal that is received by a tonetransmission device 310. The tone transmission device 310 may receivethe one or more tones in a broadcast signal and output the one or morereceived tones with the broadcast signal. The one or more received tonesmay be communicated by the tone transmission device 310 to a mobiledevice 315. For example, one or more suitable output devices 320, suchas one or more speakers associated with the tone transmission device310, may be utilized to output the one or more tones. The one or moretones may then be received by one or more input devices 325, such as amicrophone, associated with the mobile device 315. In this regard, oneor more tones included in a broadcast signal may be communicated to amobile device 315, and the mobile device 315 may process the one or morereceived tones to extract user prompting information and/or one or morelocation identifiers that may be utilized to obtain user promptinginformation for output to a mobile device user to gather user feedbackinformation associated with the one or more tones, as is described infurther detail with reference to FIGS. 5-9 below.

In certain embodiments of the invention, a broadcast entity 305 maycommunicate a broadcast signal directly to a tone transmission device310. For example, a broadcast entity 305 may utilize one or moretransmission towers 330 to transmit or otherwise communicate audioand/or video signals that may be directly received by the tonetransmission device 310 and/or equipment associated with the tonetransmission device 310, for example, an antenna associated with thetone transmission device 310.

In other embodiments of the invention, a broadcast entity 305 maycommunicate a broadcast signal to one or more intermediary systemsand/or service providers 335, 340, 345, 350. The one or moreintermediary systems and/or service providers 335, 340, 345, 350 mayreceive the broadcast signal from the broadcast entity 305 andcommunicate the broadcast signal to the tone transmission device 310. Awide variety of techniques and/or systems may be utilized as desired tocommunicate the broadcast signal from the broadcast entity 305 to anintermediary system or service provider 335, 340, 345, 350. For example,the broadcast entity 305 may communicate a broadcast signal to anintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 via one or more satellites 355and/or satellite communications systems, such as, the EchoStarTechnologies™ satellite communications system. As another example, thebroadcast entity 305 may communicate a broadcast signal to anintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 via one or more suitable networks360, such as, a fiber optic network, a cable network, an IP televisionnetwork, the Internet, a wide area network, any suitable wired network,and/or any suitable wireless network. As yet another example, thebroadcast entity 305 may utilize one or more transmission towers 330 totransmit or otherwise communicate the broadcast signal to anintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350.

Any number of intermediary systems and/or service providers 335, 340,345, 350 may be utilized as desired in various embodiments of theinvention. An intermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 may receive abroadcast signal from a broadcast entity 305 or from anotherintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 as desired in variousembodiments. The intermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 may thencommunicate the received broadcast signal to the tone transmissiondevice 310 or to another intermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350. Forpurposes describing example intermediary systems 335, 340, 345, 350, theintermediary systems 335, 340, 345, 350 will be described as receiving abroadcast signal from a broadcast entity 305 and communicating thereceived broadcast signal to a tone transmission device 310. Examples ofintermediary systems and/or service providers include, but are notlimited to, a satellite provider 335, a cable provider 340, a localprovider 345, and an internet service provider 350.

A satellite provider 335 may receive a broadcast signal from thebroadcast entity 305 and transmit or otherwise communicate at least aportion of the broadcast signal to the tone transmission device 310 viaone or more suitable satellites 365 and/or satellite communicationssystems, for example, a satellite television communications system or asatellite radio communications system. Similarly, a cable provider 340may receive a broadcast signal from the broadcast entity 305 andtransmit or otherwise communicate at least a portion of the broadcastsignal to the tone transmission device 310 via one or more suitablecable networks 370. Similarly, a local provider 345 may receive abroadcast signal from the broadcast entity 305 and transmit or otherwisecommunicate at least a portion of the broadcast signal to the tonetransmission device 310 via one or more suitable transmission towers375. Similarly, an internet service provider (ISP) 350 may receive abroadcast signal from the broadcast entity 305 and transmit or otherwisecommunicate at least a portion of the broadcast signal to the tonetransmission device 310 via one or more suitable Internet connections,for example, a wide area network, etc.

As desired in various embodiments of the invention, one or moreinformation carrying tones may be incorporated into or included in thebroadcast signal that is received by the tone transmission device 310.The one or more tones may be incorporated into the broadcast signal bythe broadcast entity 305 and/or by one or more intermediary systems 335,340, 345, 350. For example, the broadcast entity 305 may insert, layer,embed, or otherwise incorporate one or more tones into a broadcaststream prior to or during the communication of the broadcast stream to atone transmission device 310 or to an intermediary system 335, 340, 345,350. The one or more tones may relate to, for example, products orservices that are advertised via the broadcast stream (e.g., televisionor radio advertisement), programs included in the broadcast stream(e.g., television shows, movies, radio shows), etc. The incorporation ofa tone into the broadcast stream may include the insertion of the toneinto the broadcast stream utilizing a wide variety of differenttechniques and/or methods, for example, modulation, the insertion of adigital packet of information that includes the tone, the transmissionof the tone in a separate channel or carrier signal, etc. Additionally,as desired in various embodiments of the invention, a tone may beincorporated into the broadcast stream as either an analog signal or asdigital information.

With continued reference to FIG. 3, the system 300 may include one ormore tone data sources 385. Each tone data source 385 may be operable tocommunicate or otherwise provide one or more tones and/or dataassociated with the generation of one or more tones to the broadcastentity 305 and/or an intermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350. In certainembodiments of the invention, a tone data source 385 may communicatetones and/or tone data to the broadcast entity 305 and/or anintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 via one or more suitable networks360, for example, a local area network, a wide area network, theInternet, a telephone network, a broadcast network, a cellular network,a Bluetooth enabled network, a Wi-Fi network, a radio frequency network,any wired network, any wireless network, etc. In this regard, thebroadcast entity 305 and/or an intermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350may receive tones that are inserted into a broadcast signal and/orinformation that may be utilized to generate tones that are insertedinto a broadcast signal. Tones and/or tone data may be communicated tothe broadcast entity 305 and/or an intermediary system 335, 340, 345,350 in response to the receipt of a request for the tones and/or tonedata. Alternatively, a tone data source 385 may push or otherwisecommunicate tones and/or tone data to the broadcast entity 305 and/or anintermediary system 335, 340, 345, 350 without the tones and/or tonedata being requested. Each tone data source 385 may be a suitableprocessor driven device with components that are similar to the tonedata sources 120 described above with reference to FIG. 1 and the tonedata sources 210 described above with reference to FIG. 2. According toone example embodiment, the tone data source 385 may be a component ofan information source, such as is described with reference to FIGS. 1-2,or otherwise associated with the same entity as an information source,such as a back-end processor facilitating communications associated withinformation carrying tones.

Once the broadcast stream is received by the tone transmission device310, the tone transmission device 310 may process and output at least aportion of the received broadcast stream via one or more suitable outputdevices 320, for example, one or more displays and/or speakersassociated with the tone transmission device 310. A wide variety of tonetransmission devices 310 may be utilized as desired in variousembodiments of the invention, for example, a radio, television,projector, computer, etc. In certain embodiments of the invention, thebroadcast stream may be processed and output in real time or near realtime as it is received by the tone transmission device 310. In otherembodiments of the invention, at least a portion of the broadcast streammay be stored in one or more suitable memory devices associated with thetone transmission device 310 (e.g., a digital video recorder), and thestored portion of the broadcast stream may be accessed from memory,processed, and/or output at a subsequent point in time.

During the outputting of the broadcast stream by the tone transmissiondevice 310, one or more tones included in the broadcast stream may beoutput. A mobile device 315 that is within a predetermined distance orrange “d” from the tone transmission device 310 may be utilized toreceive the one or more tones that are output. The mobile device 315 mayprocess one or more received tones in order to extract user promptinginformation and/or one or more location identifiers that are utilized torequest and receive other user prompting information associated with theone or more tones from an information source and/or the like. In thisregard, feedback information associated with a broadcast stream, forexample, user-specific voting information, rating information, contentselection information, and/or user preference information provided bythe mobile device user may be received from a mobile device 315 via theuser prompting information presented to a user of the mobile device.

FIG. 4 illustrates a block diagram of data that may be included in anexample information carrying tone, according to an illustrativeembodiment of the invention. With reference to FIG. 4, an informationcarrying tone 400 may include a header portion 405, a data portion 410,and/or a check sum portion 415, according to one embodiment. The headerportion 405 may include, for example, information that identifies thetone 400 and data portion 410 that is included in the tone 400. The dataportion 410 may include a data payload, for example, one or morelocation identifiers (and/or other user prompting information), that maybe extracted from the tone 400 by a mobile device. Any number oflocation identifiers may be included in the data portion 410 as desiredin various embodiments of the invention. In the example embodiment shownin FIG. 4, location identifiers 420 and/or information sourceidentifiers 425 may be included in the data portion 410 as desired. Aninformation source identifier 425 may identify, reference, or point toan information source at which user prompts and/or user feedbackinformation associated with the tone 400 is stored. A locationidentifier 420 may identify, reference, or point to a memory location orblock of memory at which user prompting information associated with thetone 400 is stored at an information source and/or user feedback will bestored and/or further processed. Other user prompt information may beincluded in the data portion 410 of the tone 400, according to variousembodiments. In other embodiments of the invention, user-specificidentifiers and/or other information may also be included in the dataportion 410 of the tone. As shown in the example embodiment of FIG. 4,the check sum portion 415 may include information that may be utilizedby a receiving mobile device to verify that the tone 400 has beenproperly received.

The tone 400 described with reference to FIG. 4 illustrates one exampleof the information that may be included in a tone 400 that is utilizedin various embodiments of the invention described herein. A wide varietyof other information and/or information formats may be utilized to forma tone as desired in various embodiments of the invention. The tone 400of FIG. 4 is provided by way of example only and is not intended to belimiting.

Additionally, when a tone is output to a mobile device by a tonetransmission device, the tone may be output as an analog signal. Incertain embodiments of the invention, analog data for a tone may bereceived or accessed from memory by a tone transmission device, and theanalog data may be output for receipt by a mobile device. In otherembodiments of the invention, digital data for a tone may be received oraccessed from memory by a tone transmission device, and the digital datamay be transformed into analog data and output for receipt by a mobiledevice. A tone may be output utilizing a wide variety of signals asdesired in various embodiments of the invention. For example, in certainembodiments, the information carried in a tone may be added to a base orcarrier signal by modulating the base signal.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of one example method 500 for receivinginformation carrying tones at a mobile device, subsequent processing ofthe tone data by the mobile device, and/or providing feedbackinformation from a mobile device, according to an illustrativeembodiment of the invention. As described herein, receiving tone data ata mobile device of a mobile device user creates a variety of opportunityto efficiently and effectively interact with the mobile device user,such as opportunities to receive feedback information from the mobiledevice user and/or provide the mobile device user with additionalcontent embodied in various forms in response to receiving user feedbackinformation.

The method 500 may begin at block 505, in which a mobile device mayreceive a tone that includes tone data that contains and/or isassociated with user prompting information (e.g., one or more locationidentifiers). The mobile device may be any mobile device, such as themobile device 110 described in detail with reference to FIG. 1.Similarly, the tone may be transmitted to the mobile device in a mannersimilar to that described with reference to FIGS. 1-4, such as, but notlimited to, via a television broadcast, radio broadcast, or a standalonetone transmission device.

For example, as described above, a mobile device user may cause themobile device to receive a tone when one is being communicated, such asmay be indicated in a radio or television broadcast or as may be statedin an advertisement display associated with a standalone tonetransmission device. According to one embodiment, the mobile device mayinclude programming instructions, such as the tone processingapplication 137 described with reference to FIG. 1, operable to providea command to receive a tone being communicated. For example, the toneprocessing application may activate a microphone or other audio inputdevice to capture the tone and store the tone and/or extracted tone datain memory.

Following block 505 is block 510, in which the mobile device may processthe tone to extract the tone data. As described above with reference toFIG. 1, the tone data may be embodied in many forms and the tone mayrequire additional processing to extract and/or further operate on thetone data. According to one embodiment, the tone data may include alocation identifier that is generated and/or associated with userprompting information stored and/or maintained by an information source,such as a central information source and/or third party informationsource as described herein. Thus, as part of the processing performed atblock 510, programming instructions, such as the tone processingapplication, and/or associated mobile device hardware, such as one ormore band pass filters and one or more analog-to-digital converters, canprocess the tone to identify and extract tone data, including one ormore location identifiers. In other embodiments of the invention, thetone data may include user prompting information, which may be extractedand output to the mobile device user and/or stored in the mobile devicememory for later use. Additional processing, as further describedherein, may be performed on the tone received by the mobile device, atthis or any other point of the method 500.

According to one embodiment, tone processing may include associatingmobile device or mobile device user specific information with theextracted tone data, such association and/or tone data may besubsequently transmitted to one or more information sources. Forexample, in one embodiment, the tone processing application may beconfigured to request input from the mobile device user, such asuser-specific information, which may include information such as, butnot limited to, name, street address, city, state, zip code, telephonenumber(s), email address, age information, preferences, identificationnumber, user name, password information, account information, and/or thelike. Additional input may also be requested. The input provided by themobile device user may then be associated with the tone data in a memoryof the mobile device, permitting the mobile device to subsequentlytransmit the information to an information source.

According to another embodiment, the tone processing application may beconfigured to extract pre-established information that may be used toidentify the mobile device user, such as may be stored in a userprofile, such as the user profile 138 described with reference toFIG. 1. For example, the user profile may include name, account number,email address, username, home address, area code, zip code, phonenumber, identification number, and/or other information that may beuseful in responding to user prompting information. In certainembodiments, the user profile may include one or more user preferencesassociated with types of desired tones (e.g., tones carrying userprompting information such as location identifiers) and/or additionaluser prompting information that may be received and processed by themobile device. For example, the user profile may include preferencesindicating that certain tones and/or user prompting information shouldbe or should not be received and/or processed by the mobile device. Inthis regard, tones and/or user prompting information may be filtered bythe mobile device. A wide variety of different preferences and/orcriteria may be utilized as desired in various embodiments, includingbut not limited to, merchant criteria, merchant class or merchant typecriteria, broadcaster criteria, marketing source criteria, etc. Asanother example, the user profile may include one or more preferencesassociated with the manner in which tones and/or user promptinginformation should be processed by the mobile device.

In other example embodiments of the invention, user promptinginformation and/or feedback information may be stored in the userprofile, Such user prompting information and/or user-specific feedbackinformation may be utilized when communicating with an informationsource. In yet another embodiment, the tone processing application maybe configured to extract information resident with the mobile device,such as a mobile device number, UICC identifier, UDID identifier, SIMcard identifier, IMSI number, or mobile device number information whichmay also be transmitted to an information source to identify the mobiledevice user.

According to yet another embodiment, the tone processing applicationand/or the mobile device may not be configured to request input from themobile device user until the mobile device receives a request fromanother entity, such as an information source. For example, a requestfor information may be transmitted after an information source isnotified that the mobile device received a tone and respective tonedata, as further described below.

Following block 510 is block 515, in which the tone data extracted fromthe tone and/or additional information input by the mobile device usermay be stored in a memory of the mobile device. In some exampleembodiments, the tone data may be stored in the memory only temporarily,such as when it may be transmitted to retrieve user promptinginformation from another information source, or may be further operatedon by the processor of the mobile device, such as to retrieve userprompting information stored in or otherwise accessible by the mobiledevice (e.g., stored in a user profile), to display informationassociated with the tone data, and/or to request information from themobile device user of the mobile device. In other embodiments, the tonedata may be permanently stored in the memory, or stored in the memoryfor a defined period of time. In yet other embodiments, the tone datamay be immediately transmitted to another entity, such as an informationsource, and storage in memory for any prolonged period of time may beunnecessary.

Following block 515 is block 520, in which the mobile device maytransmit to an information source an indication that the mobile devicereceived the tone. The information source to which the indication can betransmitted may include, but is not limited to, a central informationsource, such as a back-end processor, or another entity, such as a thirdparty information source associated with a merchant, manufacturer, orservice provider associated with a product, service, or contentassociated with user prompting information. This transmission may beperformed to inform the information source that the mobile devicereceived the tone, and may include tone data extracted from the tone,such as a location identifier that may be extracted at block 510.

In other embodiments, however, the initial transmission from the mobiledevice to the information source may serve both to indicate that themobile device received the tone and that the mobile device user of themobile device wishes to receive user prompting information. As anexample, according to one embodiment, when viewing a televisionbroadcast, user prompting information may be displayed on the screenand/or described in the audio portion of the content. As part of theuser prompting information, the instructions may indicate that theviewer may activate their mobile device to subsequently receive othertones. For example, a television broadcast may indicate to viewers thatadditional user prompting information, such as one or more prompts forvoting information, rating information, content selection information,user preference information, and/or the like, may be received and/orretrieved by activating a mobile device to receive one or more tones.Upon receiving the tone, and extracting the location identifier or othertone data, the mobile device may transmit an indication to theinformation source that the user received the tone and the locationidentifier (or other unique identifier) extracted from the tone, whichmay serve to request additional information associated with the uniqueidentifier (e.g., user prompting information) from the informationsource. According to another embodiment, however, a request foradditional information may be transmitted separately from the indicationthat the mobile device received the tone.

Moreover, according to one embodiment, the indication transmitted atblock 520 may also include an identifier of the mobile device and/or themobile device user of the mobile device, such as is described above withreference to block 515. The identifier of the mobile device user and/orthe mobile device may be used by the information source to associatesubsequent information transmitted to/from the mobile device (e.g.,update a user profile associated with the mobile device or mobile deviceuser), as well as to identify the mobile device user to a third partyinformation source, such as a merchant, manufacturer, or serviceprovider.

Following block 520 is block 525, in which user prompting informationmay be received and/or displayed on the mobile device. In embodiments inwhich user prompting information may be requested (or automaticallytransmitted) after initially receiving the information carrying tone,the mobile device may receive user prompting information from aninformation source.

According to various embodiments, the user prompting information may bereceived by the mobile device via cellular communication, such as an SMSmessage, email, audio message, or a website address, for example. Uponreceiving the user prompting information, the mobile device and its toneprocessing application may perform additional processing on theinformation prior to display to the mobile device user.

In other embodiments, however, the mobile device may already have userprompting information stored in memory, such as information which mayhave been previously stored in memory of the mobile device whendownloading a software application or associated applicationsupplements. Information already stored in memory may be displayedseparately or as a supplement to user prompting information receivedfrom an information source.

According to one embodiment, the mobile device may format and output theuser prompting information to the mobile device user. For example, afterany processing that may be required is performed, the user promptinginformation may be output in text form to a display screen or as anaudio message played over a speaker.

According to another embodiment, however, the user prompting informationmay be presented by a website or other Internet-based applicationaccessible over a cellular network (or other network, such as Wi-Finetwork), such that when displaying user prompting information, themobile device accesses a website providing the information. The websiteaddress or other identifier may be provided to the mobile device inresponse to transmitting the indication and/or request for informationto an information source at block 520. According to other embodiments,however, the tone data transmitted with the tone and extracted by themobile device at blocks 505 and 510 may also include website addressinformation, eliminating the need to transmit a request for userprompting information from an information source. Providing theinformation via a website also allows for the dynamic delivery ofadditional content based on the mobile device user's access or selectionwithin the website (e.g., hyperlinks), thereby expanding the volume ofinformation that may be displayed to the mobile device user. However,some mobile devices may not be operable to access Internet-basedapplications; thus, text and/or audio data transmitted to the mobiledevice, as described above, permit user prompting information to bepresented to the user.

User prompting information transmitted and/or displayed to the user mayinclude, but is not limited to, requests for input from the mobiledevice user, such as one or more prompts for voting information, ratinginformation, content selection information, user preference information,and/or the like. Moreover, while only a single message is described,user prompting information may be transmitted to and received by themobile device as multiple messages.

Following block 525 is block 530, in which the mobile device user mayprovide feedback information to one or more information sources. Inexample embodiments of the invention, the feedback information mayinclude voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, other information that may beresponsive to the user prompting information, and/or other informationthat relates to particular content, products, or services related to thetone received at the mobile device. In an example embodiment of theinvention, the feedback information may be provided by the mobile deviceuser in response to the user prompting information transmitted to themobile device in block 625. In example embodiments of the invention themobile device user may have entered the feedback information into themobile device for transmission to one or more information sources (e.g.,a central information source) for processing and/or further transmissionto another entity (e.g., another information source, retailer, onlinemerchant, etc.) for processing, as described in further detail withreference to FIGS. 6-7 below. In other embodiments of the invention, atleast some of the feedback information is stored in the mobile device(e.g., in a user profile) and is retrieved and transmitted to one ormore information sources for processing and/or further transmission toanother entity (e.g., another information source, retailer, onlinemerchant, etc.) for processing.

The feedback information may be transmitted to one or more informationsources in various ways. Blocks 535, 540, 545, 550, 555 illustrateexample techniques for presenting feedback information to one or moreinformation sources. Though, as described herein, other means fortransmitting feedback information may be employed, according to variousembodiments of the invention.

According to one example embodiment, block 535 may follow block 530. Atblock 535, a mobile device user may provide feedback information tovarious information sources and/or terminals via email, SMS textmessaging, or using short range wireless communications (e.g., Bluetoothmessaging, etc.) of the mobile device. In some embodiments of theinvention, the mobile device user may generate the email, text message,or other messaging to contain the feedback information for transmissionto the one or more information sources. In other embodiments of theinvention, the user prompting information received at the mobile devicemay prompt and/or pre-populate such response messaging (e.g., email,text message, etc.) to either include feedback information (e.g., storedinformation from a user profile) or be ready to receive feedbackinformation from the mobile device user for transmission to one or moreinformation sources.

According to yet another embodiment, block 540 may instead follow fromblock 530, in which a signal from another device in communication withthe mobile device may transmit the feedback information to one or moreinformation sources. For example, the mobile device may be incommunication with a desktop computer, where the mobile device user mayaccess a web browser on the desktop computer and provide feedbackinformation through the web browser on the desktop computer. In otherembodiments of the invention the mobile device user may access otherdevices, including other mobile devices, to provide the feedbackinformation to one or more information sources.

According to yet another embodiment, block 545 may instead follow fromblock 530, in which the mobile device user may place a telephone call toprovide the feedback information. In example embodiments of theinvention, the tone data received by the mobile device may include atelephone number for a user to provide feedback information. In otherembodiments the telephone number used to provide feedback informationmay be presented to the user through media content (e.g.,advertisements, scrolls or graphics displayed on a television screenduring a broadcast of a television program, etc.). In exampleembodiments of the invention, the mobile device user may provide verbalfeedback information via the telephone call or may be prompted via aninteractive voice response (IVR) system to provide feedback via keypadselections.

According to yet another embodiment, block 550 may follow block 530, inwhich a mobile device user may transmit a tone from the mobile device toa terminal to provide feedback information. For example, in oneembodiment, the feedback information may be in the form of a tonecarrying tone data that is associated with the user promptinginformation, associated with the mobile device user, and/or associatedwith an account associated with the mobile device user. In one example,the mobile device may be able to generate and transmit the tone afterreceiving, generating, and/or processing feedback information to be sentto one or more information sources.

Accordingly, in this example, a mobile device user may command themobile device to transmit the tone to provide the feedback information.In one embodiment, the tone may be transmitted to a transactionterminal, such as a POS terminal operable with a receiver, such as amicrophone or other transducer. In another embodiment, the tone may betransmitted to another mobile device for transaction processing (e.g.,another mobile device in communication with or acting as a transactionterminal). A tone processing application of the mobile device user'smobile device, such as the tone processing application 137 describedwith reference to FIG. 1, can be configured for generating and/orretrieving the tone from memory and transmitting the tone from themobile device, such as via a speaker of the mobile device, uponreceiving the mobile device user's command to transmit the feedbackinformation. According to another embodiment, instead of, or in additionto, transmitting a tone from the mobile device, a radio frequency signalmay be transmitted to a transaction terminal or other transactionprocessor from the mobile device containing, or otherwise associatedwith, feedback information.

According to yet another embodiment, block 555 may follow block 530. Atblock 555, a mobile device user may provide feedback information duringan online or mobile transaction. For example, feedback information maybe entered or otherwise transmitted over a website, or other mobiletransaction processing application. In one embodiment, the feedbackinformation, such as voting information, rating information, contentselection information, user preference information, other informationthat may be responsive to the user prompting information, and/or otherinformation that relates to particular content, products, or servicesrelated to the tone received at the mobile device can be automaticallyassociated with the online or mobile transaction information, such as byprogramming instructions stored on the mobile device, or automaticallyassociated with the tone processing application or other transactionprocessing application. In another embodiment, the mobile device usermay manually enter feedback information, such as voting information,rating information, content selection information, user preferenceinformation, etc., in an online or mobile transaction form forsubmission to one or more information sources for processing.

Following block 555 is block 560, in which additional content isreceived by the mobile device in response to the provided feedbackinformation. In block 560, an information source (e.g., the centralinformation source) or other entity involved in the feedback informationprocessing and/or communication with the mobile device, may generateand/or transmit additional content that is received at the mobiledevice. In example embodiments of the invention, the content may provideadditional information relating to the feedback information. In variousexample embodiments of the invention, the additional content provided tothe mobile device may include, depending on the nature of the feedbackinformation, (1) reward content for providing feedback information, forexample, coupons for future purchases, (2) additional product or serviceinformation, (3) other mobile device user feedback information such asvoting results, overall rating information, related or recommendedcontent based on the mobile device user's or others' feedbackinformation, (4) updated user profile information such as accountinformation, (5) confirmation of receipt of the feedback informationand/or updates made based on the feedback information, and/or (6) anyother information that may be useful to the mobile device user havingprovided feedback information relating to media content, products,services, etc.

In example embodiments of the invention, the additional content may betransmitted to the mobile device associated with the mobile device uservia email, SMS text messaging, to a browser via the Internet, viasubsequent tones, etc. The method 500 may end after block 560, havingreceived additional content at a mobile device in response to a mobiledevice user providing feedback information to one or more informationsources. In other embodiments of the invention, receiving additionalcontent at the mobile device in response to the mobile device usersending feedback information to one or more information sources may beunnecessary.

FIG. 6 is a flow chart of one example method for processing userprompting information and/or feedback information at an informationsource, according to an illustrative embodiment of the invention. Forexample, according to one embodiment, user prompting information may betied to an event or activity, such as a television or radio broadcast, asporting event, game show, specific time of day, etc., and a locationidentifier associated with user prompting information may be transmittedto a mobile device upon confirming that such an event or activityoccurred and/or that the mobile device user participated or isparticipating in the event or activity.

The method 600 may provide for associating tones with user promptinginformation, transmitting information carrying tones to a mobile device,and subsequent communications with the mobile device based on the mobiledevice having received a given tone. Accordingly, an information source,such as a central information source, such as a back-end processor, orany third party information source, such as a merchant, manufacturer,service provider, and/or the like, can interact with consumers via theirmobile device to obtain feedback information from the consumers forfurther processing (e.g., monitoring consumer preferences or behavior,customizing marketing efforts for a particular consumer or group ofconsumers, etc.).

The method 600 may begin at block 605, in which an information sourcemay associate user prompting information with one or more tones to betransmitted to one or more mobile devices. At block 605, an informationsource may associate user prompting information with one or more tones(or tone data carried by the tones) to be transmitted to one or moremobile devices. For example, a location identifier may be created thatassociated a particular tone with particular user prompting information.The location identifier may then be included in the tone as tone data.The information source may be any information source, such as theinformation source 115 described in detail with reference to FIG. 1.

In one example, a central information source may receive user promptinginformation from another entity, such as any third party entityassociated with a product, service, or content associated with the userprompting information. The central information source may then store theuser prompting information in memory, such as in one or more databasesor other data storage devices, associated with tones and/or tone data.For example, as described in more detail herein with reference to FIG.1, tone data transmitted by a tone, such as a location identifier orother unique identifier, may be associated with the user promptinginformation such that it may be used to identify the user promptinginformation when received. The tone data may permit the centralinformation source (or other entity) to search for user promptinginformation stored in a memory. In one embodiment, tone data may includea location identifier or other unique identifier that indicates anotherinformation source, such as a third party information source, wherebythe location identifier can be utilized to request user promptinginformation from another information source, such as is described indetail with reference to FIG. 7 for example.

Following block 605 is block 610, in which one or more informationcarrying tones associated with the user prompting information aretransmitted to the mobile device. Tones may be transmitted to a mobiledevice using any tone transmission device, such as one or more tonetransmission devices 105 described with reference to FIG. 1. Forexample, a tone transmission device may include, but is not limited to,such as a television transmitting audiovisual content, a radiotransmitter transmitting radio content, or a standalone tonetransmission device. The mobile device may be any mobile device, such asthe mobile device 110 as described with reference to FIG. 1.

In example embodiments, a mobile device may perform additionalprocessing of a received tone, such as to extract tone data from thetone. In one example, the mobile device may perform processing toextract a location identifier or other unique identifier that isassociated with user prompting information, as described with referenceto block 605. In other embodiments, the mobile device may performadditional processing, including, but not limited to, storing thereceived tone and/or the extracted tone data in memory, retrievingadditional information from a memory of the mobile device, requestinginput from a mobile device user, and/or receiving the mobile deviceuser's input, prior to any subsequent transmissions with an informationsource in response to receiving a tone.

Following block 610 is block 615, in which an information sourcereceives an indication that the mobile device received the tonetransmitted at block 610. The indication may be received to inform theinformation source that the mobile device received the tone, and may, insome example embodiments, include tone data extracted from the tone,such as a location identifier or other unique identifier. In otherembodiments, however, the initial receipt of the indication from themobile device may serve both to indicate that the mobile device receivedthe tone and to request user prompting information, such as one or moreprompts for voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, and/or the like.

In example embodiments, the indication received at block 615 can includeone or more of a location identifier or other unique identifierextracted from the tone, an identifier of the mobile device, and/or anidentifier of the mobile device user. The identifier of the mobiledevice and/or mobile device user may be used by the information sourceto associate subsequent information transmitted to/from the mobiledevice, and/or to identify the mobile device user to a third partyinformation source, such as a retailer, service provider, productmanufacturer, etc. According to one embodiment, one or more of theidentifier of the mobile device user or the mobile device may be storedin a user profile associated with the mobile device, such as the userprofile 138 as described with reference to FIG. 1.

In other embodiments, however, multiple messages may be received fromthe mobile device at block 615. For example, one or more separatemessages may be transmitted from the mobile device identifying the tonedata, the mobile device, the mobile device user, and/or any otherinformation. In another example, one or more separate message may betransmitted form the mobile device requesting user prompting informationor other processing such as feedback information processing, usagetracking, etc.

Moreover, according to one embodiment, the information source operableto receive the indication at block 615 can be the same informationsource, or one associated therewith, that associates the feedbackinformation to the tone, such as the central information sourcedescribed at block 605. For example, the central information source maybe responsible for generating the user prompting information, storingthe user prompting information, associating user prompting informationto one or more tones, and subsequently processing user promptinginformation. Though, in other embodiments, the information sourceoperable to receive the indication at block 615 may be a differentinformation source from the information source that associates the userprompting information to the tone at block 605. For example, a thirdparty information source, such as a different back-end processor, mayparticipate in processing user prompting information for a mobile deviceuser, instead of or in addition to the central information source. Inyet other embodiments, a central information source and one or morethird party information sources may participate together, exchanginginformation therebetween, to retrieve and/or transmit user promptinginformation, as described in detail with reference to FIG. 7.

Following block 615 is block 620, in which user prompting information isretrieved from one or more information sources. In example embodimentsof the invention, the information source may retrieve user promptinginformation from memory based on the one or more location identifiersreceived from the mobile device identifying the memory location and/orother entity where the associated user prompting information is stored.In yet other embodiments, a central information source and one or morethird party information sources may participate together, exchanginginformation therebetween, to retrieve and/or transmit user promptinginformation, as described in detail with reference to FIG. 7, forexample.

Following block 620 is block 625, in which user prompting information istransmitted to the mobile device user. The user prompting informationtransmitted may be one or more user interfaces, prompts, and/orinquiries for voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, and/or the like. In exampleembodiments of the invention, the transmitted user prompting informationmay be sent via email, SMS text messaging, to a browser via theInternet, subsequent tones, etc.

Following block 625 is block 630, in which feedback information isreceived at one or more information sources from the mobile device. Inexample embodiments of the invention, the feedback information mayinclude voting information, rating information, content selectioninformation, user preference information, other information that may beresponsive to the user prompting information, and/or other informationthat relates to particular content, products, or services related to thetone received at the mobile device. In an example embodiment of theinvention, the feedback information may be received in response to theuser prompting information transmitted to the mobile device in block625. In example embodiments of the invention the mobile device user mayhave entered the feedback information into the mobile device fortransmission to one or more information sources (e.g., a centralinformation source) for processing and/or further transmission toanother entity (e.g., another information source, retailer, onlinemerchant, etc.) for processing. In other embodiments of the invention,at least some of the feedback information was stored in the mobiledevice (e.g., in a user profile) and was retrieved and transmitted toone or more information sources for processing and/or furthertransmission to another entity (e.g., another information source,retailer, online merchant, etc.) for processing.

Following block 630 is block 635, in which the feedback information maybe processed by the information source. In some example embodiments, theinformation source may, itself, parse the feedback information andprocess the parsed information. Such processing may include marketinganalysis and/or reporting (e.g., analyzing consumer satisfaction ordissatisfaction with content, such as a television or radio show,particular entity, brand, person, product, service, etc., to make futuremarketing and/or content decisions), individual consumer preferenceand/or activity updates (e.g., updating a user profile associated withthat particular mobile device user based on the feedback informationtracking user preferences for the user to access and use or to providemore targeted content to that mobile device user), determiningadditional content to present to the mobile device user in response tothe feedback (e.g., determining reward content, such as coupons,vouchers, discount information, to be provided in response to receivingfeedback information, retrieving results of other user's feedbackinformation for presentation to the mobile device user, or determiningcontent recommendations based on the feedback information or others'feedback information) and/or other processing performed using thefeedback information received from the mobile device. Other forms offeedback information processing may also be incorporated in exampleembodiments of the invention.

In other embodiments of the invention, the information source thatreceived the feedback information may forward that information to otherentities (e.g., another information source, retailer, online merchant,etc.) for additional processing, and/or the information source may workin conjunction with such other entities to process the feedbackinformation similar to the processing described above.

Whether or not it is the receiving information source or another entitythat processes the feedback information, block 640 is invoked afterblock 635 to provide additional content to the mobile device user inresponse to the received feedback information. In block 640, aninformation source (e.g., the central information source) or otherentity involved in the feedback information processing and/orcommunication with the mobile device, may generate and/or transmitadditional content to the mobile device user.

In example embodiments of the invention, the content may provideadditional information relating to the feedback information. In variousexample embodiments of the invention, the additional content provided tothe mobile device may include, depending on the nature of the feedbackinformation, (1) reward content for providing feedback information, forexample, coupons for future purchases, (2) additional product or serviceinformation, (3) other mobile device user feedback information such asvoting results, overall rating information, related or recommendedcontent based on the mobile device user's or others' feedbackinformation, (4) updated user profile information such as accountinformation, (5) confirmation of receipt of the feedback informationand/or updates made based on the feedback information, and/or (6) anyother information that may be useful to the mobile device user havingprovided feedback information relating to media content, products,services, etc.

In some example embodiments of the invention, the additional content maybe transmitted to the mobile device associated with the mobile deviceuser via email, SMS text messaging, to a browser via the Internet,subsequent tones, etc. In other example embodiments of the invention,the additional content may be provided to the mobile device userseparate from the mobile device (e.g., mail, television, radio,telephone, desktop computer, etc.). The method 600 may end after block640, having communicated additional content to a mobile device user inresponse to receiving feedback information from the mobile device user.In other embodiments of the invention, providing additional content tothe mobile device user in response to receiving feedback informationfrom that mobile device user may be unnecessary.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart of one example method for processing userprompting information and/or mobile device user feedback informationwith multiple information sources, according to an illustrativeembodiment of the invention. The method 700 may provide integrationbetween a central information source and one or more third partyinformation sources, distributing the roles and responsibilitiestherebetween. By distributing some functions to be performed to one ormore third party information sources, the amount of data and transactionprocessing managed by a central information source may be reduced. Inaddition, by including the third party information sources, such asthose sponsoring or otherwise associated with user promptinginformation, additional rules and business logic may be implemented byeach third party information source that is particular to that entityand/or more specific to user prompting information and/or the product,service, or content associated with the user prompting information. Itmay be beneficial to limit the amount of information provided to and/orprocessed by a central information source, such as to maintain companytrade secrets, business advantages, marketing information, userprompting information, feedback information, and/or the like.Accordingly, the method 700 provides one example embodiment of limitingthat amount of information and/or transaction processing performed by acentral information source by integrating the use of one or more thirdparty information sources into the process.

The method 700 may begin at block 705. At block 705, a centralinformation source receives an indication that a mobile device receiveda tone that contained and/or has been associated with user promptinginformation. Following block 705 is block 710, in which the centralinformation source may identify particular user prompting informationwith which the received tone (e.g., a location identifier contained inthe received tone) contained or is otherwise associated. In one exampleembodiment, the central information source may store user promptinginformation in a memory, such as in a look-up table, relationaldatabase, or other data storage means. In another embodiment, thecentral information source may just associate tone data, such as alocation identifier or other unique identifier with one or more thirdparty information sources, such that the central information source needonly to transmit the location identifier or other unique identifier tothe proper third party information source, which can reply withassociated user prompting information and/or continue solicitingfeedback information and/or handle feedback information processingdirectly with the mobile device or mobile device user.

Following block 710 is block 715, in which the central informationsource may associate the mobile device user (or associate the mobiledevice) with the user prompting information identified in block 710and/or associate the mobile device user (or associate the mobile device)with user feedback information provided in response to user promptinginformation. For example, the central information source at block 705may store mobile device identifiers (e.g., telephone number, a UICCidentifier, UDID identifier, a SIM card identifier, a IMSI number, etc.)and/or mobile device user identifiers (e.g., a telephone number, name,username, email address, account number, identification number, etc.) inmemory, such as in one or more records associated with user promptinginformation and/or user feedback information provided in response touser prompting information transmitted to a mobile device. In anotherembodiment, the mobile device identifier alone may be used to identifythe mobile device user, and no further association with the mobiledevice user may be performed. The mobile device identifier and/or mobiledevice user identifier may be provided automatically as part of themessage received from the mobile device, may be provided by the mobiledevice user entering such information into the mobile device, may beprovided in a separate message, or may be previously stored in memory,such as if the mobile device user has previously registered with thecentral information source (or other entity). According to one example,the mobile device may include programming instructions and a userprofile, such as the tone processing application 137 and the userprofile 138 described with reference to FIG. 1, which together areoperable to retrieve mobile device identifiers and/or mobile device useridentifiers stored in the user profile and may be included in one ormore messages transmitted to the central information source (or otherinformation source). In other examples, one or more messages transmittedto an information source may automatically include a mobile deviceidentifier and/or mobile device user identifier, such as a telephonenumber.

By associating the mobile device user (or the mobile device) with theuser prompting information, the central information source and anysubsequent third party information sources, may have a record of whichmobile device user received a tone. Such a record may be used tofacilitate feedback information processing (e.g., marketing analysisand/or reporting efforts) and/or providing additional content inresponse to feedback information received from a mobile device inresponse to the user prompting information provided to that mobiledevice.

Following block 715 is block 720, in which the central informationsource may determine one or more third party information sourcesassociated with the user prompting information identified at block 710and/or any particular content, product, or service associated with theidentified user prompting information. As described above, the centralinformation source may store, in a memory, an association between therespective message transmitted to an information source (or tone datacontained in the message) and a third party associated with therespective user prompting information.

Following block 720 is block 725, in which the central informationsource may transmit a message to the third party information sourceidentified at block 720. In various embodiments, the message may includethe tone data received with the indication at block 705, any userprompting information that may be stored by the central informationsource and retrieved at block 710, mobile device user identifiers and/ormobile device identifiers determined at block 715, feedback informationdata received from a mobile device, and/or the like. The centralinformation source and any third party information sources maycommunicate over a network, such as the network 140 described in detailwith reference to FIG. 1.

In one embodiment, the central information source may transmit the tonedata, other user prompting information, and/or a mobile device useridentifier to the third party information source, thereby leaving anyadditional communications and transaction processing to the third partyinformation source. For example, the third party information source canthen communicate directly with the mobile device (or with the mobiledevice user by any other means) to provide user prompting informationand/or receive feedback information from the mobile device. Accordingly,no further processing and/or communications would be required by thecentral information source. Though, in one embodiment, the third partyinformation source may communicate a status update to the centralinformation source for reporting, record keeping, and/or the like.

In another embodiment, the central information source may act more as anintermediary between the mobile device and the third party informationsource. For example, upon receiving the indication that the mobiledevice has received the tone, the central information source maytransmit the tone data and/or other user prompting information with amobile device user identifier to one or more third party informationsources, and receive subsequent instructions and/or messages from thethird party information source(s) for relaying to the mobile device ormobile device user. As another example, the information source maytransmit feedback information received from the mobile device inresponse to the user prompting information provided to the mobile deviceto the third party information source for processing.

In yet another embodiment, the central information source may performmuch of the transaction processing, including providing user promptinginformation to the mobile device and/or mobile device user, receivingfeedback information from the mobile device, and/or transmitting statusupdates and/or other messages (e.g., feedback information received fromthe mobile device) to the third party information source. Thus, in oneembodiment, the messages transmitted at block 725 may be updates or onlyrequire minimal processing by the third party information source.

Following block 725 is block 730, in which the central informationsource may receive communications from the third party informationsource in response to the communications sent in block 725. According toone embodiment, the third party information source may transmit messageinformation to be sent by the central information source to the mobiledevice, such as user prompting information. According to anotherembodiment, the third party information source may transmit statusupdates to the central information source in response to communicatingdirectly with the mobile device.

In one embodiment, the central information source may store informationcontained in the communications received at block 730 in a memory. Forexample, the information received may be stored for subsequent retrievaland transmission to the mobile device. In another example, theinformation received may be stored for reporting, transaction tracking,and/or subsequent marketing communications.

Following block 730 is block 735, in which the central informationsource may optionally transmit user prompting information to the mobiledevice user. As described above, the information may be transmitted tothe mobile device user via the mobile device, for example, theinformation may be transmitted over the Internet via a website, atelephone message, via email, and/or the like. In other embodiments ofthe invention, such information may be accessible via means other thanthe mobile device. In one embodiment, the user prompting information maybe received from the third party information source at block 730 andtransmitted to the mobile device by the central information source. Asdescribed above with reference to block 725, in one embodiment, thethird party information source may perform all or most of the additionalcommunications with the mobile device and/or the mobile device user suchthat block 735 may not be performed by the central information source.

In various embodiments, blocks 725-735 may be repeated to permitmultiple messages be transmitted between the central information source,the third party information source, and/or the mobile device.

The method 700 may end after block 735, having divided some of thetransaction processing tasks between the central information source andone or more third party information sources.

Accordingly, example embodiments provide systems and methods thatcommunicating location identifiers and/or other user promptinginformation to a mobile device user, and processing the locationidentifiers and/or other user prompting information to prompt the mobiledevice user for various types of feedback information such as votinginformation, rating information, content selection information, and/oruser preference information. By associating user prompting informationwith a tone, more potential customers may be reached, due to thesimplicity of interacting with the mobile device and the immediateresults made possible by real-time messaging with central and/or thirdparty information sources. Furthermore, communicating locationidentifiers and/or other user prompting information to a mobile deviceuser to prompt the mobile device user to provide feedback informationallows for more sophisticated and effective marketing efforts and/ortargeted content to be provided to the mobile device user and/or othermobile device users.

Example embodiments provide the technical effects of systems and methodsfor communicating location identifiers and/or other user promptinginformation to a mobile device user, and processing the locationidentifiers and/or other user prompting information to prompt the mobiledevice user for various types of feedback information such as votinginformation, rating information, content selection information, and/oruser preference information. Additional technical effects includeproviding mobile devices operable to receive tones and extract one ormore location identifiers therefrom, to perform additional processing,display, and messaging related to prompts and/or user interfacesassociated with the extracted location identifiers by utilizingreal-time messaging between mobile devices and central and/or thirdparty information sources. Moreover, additional technical effectsinclude one or more information sources configured to store andassociate location identifiers with user prompting information,communicate with mobile devices, communicate with other informationsources, and perform additional processing to facilitate the receipt ofconsumer feedback information from a mobile device user for marketanalysis and/or to determine and provide targeted content to the mobiledevice user and/or other mobile device users as a result of processingsuch consumer feedback information.

Embodiments of the invention have been described herein with referenceto block and flow diagrams of systems, methods, apparatuses, and/orcomputer program products according to example embodiments of theinvention. It will be understood that one or more blocks of the blockdiagrams and flow diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the blockdiagrams and flow diagrams, respectively, can be implemented bycomputer-executable program instructions. Likewise, some blocks of theblock diagrams and flow diagrams may not necessarily need to beperformed in the order presented, or may not necessarily need to beperformed at all, according to some embodiments of the invention.

These computer-executable program instructions may be loaded onto ageneral purpose computer, a special-purpose computer, a processor, orother programmable data processing apparatus to produce a particularmachine, such that the instructions that execute on the computer,processor, or other programmable data processing apparatus create meansfor implementing one or more functions specified in the flowchart blockor blocks. These computer program instructions may also be stored in acomputer-readable memory that can direct a computer or otherprogrammable data processing apparatus to function in a particularmanner, such that the instructions stored in the computer-readablememory produce an article of manufacture including instruction meansthat implement one or more functions specified in the flow diagram blockor blocks. As an example, embodiments of the invention may provide for acomputer program product, comprising a computer usable medium having acomputer readable program code or program instructions embodied therein,said computer readable program code adapted to be executed to implementone or more functions specified in the flow diagram block or blocks. Thecomputer program instructions may also be loaded onto a computer orother programmable data processing apparatus to cause a series ofoperational elements or steps to be performed on the computer or otherprogrammable apparatus to produce a computer-implemented process suchthat the instructions that execute on the computer or other programmableapparatus provide elements or steps for implementing the functionsspecified in the flow diagram block or blocks.

Accordingly, blocks of the block diagrams and flow diagrams supportcombinations of means for performing the specified functions,combinations of elements or steps for performing the specified functionsand program instruction means for performing the specified functions. Itwill also be understood that each block of the block diagrams and flowdiagrams, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams and flowdiagrams, can be implemented by special-purpose, hardware-based computersystems that perform the specified functions, elements or steps, orcombinations of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.

In certain embodiments, performing the specified functions, elements orsteps can transform an article into another state or thing. Forinstance, example embodiments can provide certain systems and methodsthat transform a tone or multiple tones to prompts or user interfacesrequesting feedback information from mobile device users, which caninclude transforming one or more tones into location identifiers and/oruser prompting information, as described above.

Many modifications and other embodiments of the invention set forthherein will be apparent having the benefit of the teachings presented inthe foregoing descriptions and the associated drawings. Therefore, it isto be understood that the invention is not to be limited to the specificembodiments disclosed and that modifications and other embodiments areintended to be included within the scope of the appended claims.Although specific terms are employed herein, they are used in a genericand descriptive sense only and not for purposes of limitation.

1. A mobile device comprising: a network interface; a display; amicrophone; and a processor in communication with the network interface,display, and microphone, wherein the processor is configured to executecomputer executable instructions to: receive, by the microphone, a tone,wherein the tone comprises a location identifier, extract the locationidentifier from the tone, transmit, via the network interface, a signalcomprising at least a portion of the location identifier, receive, viathe network interface, user prompting information associated with thelocation identifier from a remote information source, and display atleast a portion of the user prompting information on the display.
 2. Themobile device of claim 1, wherein the tone received by the microphone issubstantially inaudible to the human ear.
 3. The mobile device of claim1, wherein the tone received by the microphone is between 16 KHz and 22kHz.
 4. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the computer executableinstructions for displaying at least a portion of the user promptinginformation on the display includes prompting a user of the mobiledevice to rate an item or rate content associated with the tone.
 5. Themobile device of claim 1, wherein the user prompting informationcomprises a notification to the mobile device user.
 6. The mobile deviceof claim 5, wherein the notification is based on a particular timeassociated with the tone, particular event associated with the tone, orparticular content associated with the tone.
 7. The mobile device ofclaim 5, wherein the notification is based on a user preference, whereinthe received tone was previously associated with the user preference. 8.The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the user prompting informationcomprises a user interface, wherein the user interface may include atleast one prompt for user feedback information.
 9. The mobile device ofclaim 8, wherein the at least one prompt is associated with votinginformation, rating information, content selection information, or userpreference information.
 10. The mobile device of claim 8, wherein theprocessor is further configured to execute computer executableinstructions to: transmit user feedback information from the mobiledevice to an information source, and receive a confirmation message,wherein the confirmation message indicates acceptance or rejection ofthe feedback information.
 11. A method comprising: receiving, by amicrophone of a mobile device, a tone, wherein the tone comprises alocation identifier; extracting, by a mobile device processor, thelocation identifier from the tone; transmitting, via a network interfaceof the mobile device, a signal comprising at least a portion of thelocation identifier; receiving, via the network interface of the mobiledevice, user prompting information associated with the locationidentifier from a remote information source; and displaying at least aportion of the user prompting information on a display of the mobiledevice.
 12. The method of claim 11, wherein the tone received by themicrophone is substantially inaudible to the human ear.
 13. The methodof claim 11, wherein the tone received by the microphone is between 16KHz and 22 kHz.
 14. The method of claim 11, wherein displaying at leasta portion of the user prompting information on the display of the mobiledevice includes prompting a user of the mobile device to rate an item orrate content associated with the tone.
 15. The method of claim 11,wherein the user prompting information comprises a notification to themobile device user.
 16. The method of claim 15, wherein the notificationis based on a particular time associated with the tone, particular eventassociated with the tone, or particular content associated with thetone.
 17. The method of claim 15, wherein the notification is based on auser preference, wherein the received tone was previously associatedwith the user preference.
 18. The method of claim 11, wherein the userprompting information comprises a user interface, wherein the userinterface may include at least one prompt for user feedback information.19. The method of claim 18, wherein the at least one prompt isassociated with voting information, rating information, contentselection information, or user preference information.
 20. The method ofclaim 18, further comprising: transmitting, by the mobile deviceprocessor, user feedback information from the mobile device to aninformation source; and receiving, at the mobile device, a confirmationmessage, wherein the confirmation message indicates acceptance orrejection of the feedback information.